


A Change in the Weather

by grav_ity



Category: Sanctuary (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-03
Updated: 2011-10-03
Packaged: 2017-10-24 07:00:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 22,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/260426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grav_ity/pseuds/grav_ity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the months leading up to the Normandy invasion, Helen deals with war, espionage, old friends and new enemies.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Applied Barometrics

**Author's Note:**

> **AN** : So this happened. It’s the result of about eighteen plot bunnies that I forced into a single story. I’m still not sure how it ended up in present tense...
> 
>  **Spoilers** : This story describes the events leading up to, surrounding and directly following “Normandy”.
> 
>  **Rating** : M, with warnings for war, espionage and Jack the Ripper.
> 
>  **Disclaimer** : I can dream!
> 
>  **Characters/Pairing** : Helen/James is the current canon, but also Nikola, Nigel, John, George S. Patton, Dwight Eisenhower, and the other characters from the episode.

**Applied Barometrics** : In which we will study the parts of the machine, the better to understand how it operates as a whole.

 _Studies in Betrayal: An Evening at the Opera with Jack the Ripper_

 _You have always appreciated the nuance of Tristan and Isolde, though you find that in your old age the romance has grown maudlin. Children know nothing of what it is to lose, what it is to be denied that which they most want. You have kept that close to your heart for longer than the actors on stage have been alive. You know how much it hurts to love._

 _You know how much it hurts to have a knife in your chest too, though you have always managed to escape and heal when it happens. You know the feel of the blade, cutting skin and slicing muscle. You know the sensation of broken bone. You have given and received in kind, and you burn from the scars in your wake._

 _Tonight there will be no scars, you have decided. Only a sharp blade and a quick escape._

 _The opera house is familiar territory to you, though you haven’t attended a play in a long time. Berlin was yours for the taking, once, back when the lights were bright in the darkness and arms opened to accept you into the community England denied you time and again. That’s all gone now, crushed under the heels of those whom you now serve, but you think about it every once in a while. It reminds you of why you are here._

 _His box is the nicest, but it doesn’t have the best view. That suits your purpose. What cannot see cannot be seen, and you’re not so fast at your job that you don’t appreciate every advantage you can get._

 _The knife is in your hand, the relic of a happier time when friends gave you such things as gifts and never considered the end to which you might put them. You sharpened the blade only this afternoon, in full view of the officers set to watch you. You have nothing to hide from them, after all, only your purpose._

 _They seemed distracted tonight. You watched them try to conceal it from you, and they thought they had, but they don’t know that you learned to read people from a master. Their excitement was palpable, lightning in the air as they spoke. You know how that goes, for you shared it with four others once, when you held a secret to your chest that could have changed the entire world. You’re not upset that they don’t tell you. You’ll only have to figure it out later._

 _You’re in your rooms now, not a prisoner by virtue of the fact that they couldn’t keep you if they tried, but not precisely trusted either. Tonight, you do not care. Tonight, you have business at the opera, and the show must go on._

 _When it’s time, you appear in the box, the knife in your hand. The music swells around you, songs of love and longing and loss. You block them out. Remembering them will get you nothing tonight, even if it is in their name that you act._

 _The knife goes in. His blood is the same as any you have ever spilt. You hope he knows that._

 _The next day, there is a parade. When Hitler passes by where you stand, sitting straight and proud in the open back of the automobile, you raise your hand and shout with the others._

 _Inside, you begin another plan._

* * *

The war offices in Portsmouth are unreasonably cramped, given the task he has been assigned. James knows it will only get worse. Right now, he only shares the too small workroom with Nigel and Helen. If everything goes to plan and they can convince Nikola to return, James has no doubt that the remaining free space will be taken up entirely by the incoherent sketches and multi-lingual notes Nikola insists on spreading around him. As it stands, there are several desks, a chalk board, and nothing even remotely resembling enough daylight. It’s blackout curtains all the time, this close to the Channel.

And if the three of them are more occupants than the room could deal with, there are also the aides to consider. Eisenhower had insisted that they be Americans, and Helen had allowed it without consulting James, and they’re all stuck with West Point’s fresh-faced finest. He honestly doesn’t care who takes his notes and fetches his tea, but the first time his lieutenant has the audacity to wink at him, it’s all he can do not to take the fellow by the shoulders and shake him until he grows some common sense.

“You know he did that because he thinks you’re sweet on Helen, right?” Nigel says after James had dismissed the aide and returned to his work. “It’s his way of saying he thinks you have a shot with her.”

“A shot?” James says, because he’s been sleeping with Helen for longer than the aide has been alive. “I should hope so.”

“I just meant that he doesn’t mean any harm,” Nigel says. “And he’s not propositioning you either, so don’t get nervous.”

“Nigel!” James says it rather sharply. They are in the business of espionage, after all, and goodness only knows how many other people Eisenhower has set to watching them.

“Oh, no one’s going to complain right now,” Nigel says. “They need you too much.”

“That’s not particularly reassuring,” James says. “Because they won’t need me forever.”

“That’s why you’ve got Helen, mate,” Nigel says. James coughs. “Not like that, and you know it. She’ll keep you safe, is all I meant.”

“I think we’ve pretty much exhausted this line of conversation,” James says.

“Quite,” Nigel agrees. “That’s the last box, anyway. Then we’re all moved in.”

James does his very best not to roll his eyes at that. They’d managed to spend the first years of the fighting working out of the Sanctuary, as they had during the last Great War. Now, planning was underway for an invasion of Europe, and they had been sent for like common soldiers. He understands it, of course, and if he were in charge he probably would have done the same thing, but that doesn’t make it any less frustrating. Moving meant moving the machine too, and he’s not so comfortable with it yet that he trusts himself out and about when there’s a war on.

But Churchill had asked, and Helen had acquiesced on all their behalves, and James had packed everything he could think about possibly needing into the boxes which were around the office now in various states of unpacking. He sat up a bit straighter in his chair, really looking at his surroundings.

“You said that’s the last box?” he asks.

“The last one on the manifest, “ Nigel says. “They’ve all got checks beside them. These Americans are very efficient.”

“Not efficient enough!” James is on his feet now, and rummaging through the offending carton.

“What is it?” Nigel comes to join him. “Is something mislabelled?”

“Worse,” James says. “Something is missing.

* * *

 _Two weeks earlier…_

“Portsmouth is hardly the end of the world, James,” Helen says, pacing back and forth across the floor in his study. Before the war, she’d have been perched on the window, looking down at the garden, but that’s not an option anymore, even though the Blitz has stopped.

“I never said that it was,” James says. “I merely pointed out that all of our things are here, and it makes little sense to move our entire operation just so they don’t have to send us telegrams anymore.”

“You know it’s not secure, James.” Helen’s protests are met with silence, because there’s really nothing he can say in his defense. “That’s why they need us there. We’ll simply have to pack up everything.”

“You’ve already told him we’ll do it.” James hasn’t got his reputation for nothing.

“Yes.” Helen sits down. “I have. They want you, your designs, your mind, your spy network and anything you might invent, and they want you in Portsmouth.”

“And you’re to keep me safe from the Nazis while I’m there?”

“Something like that, yes.” She smiles at him. “Does it bother you, darling?”

“Of course not,” he says. “There’s no one better suited for the job. Nigel will join us?”

“He will,” Helen says. “That way I’ll have some say in where he’s sent.”

“What of Nikola?” James is pushing it now, he knows, but at the same time, he doesn’t really care.

Helen slumps a little in her seat. “I have no idea where he is.”

“You’re lying again.” It’s hard when they’re both engaged in espionage, and Lord knows there are things he’s kept from her, but Nikola Tesla’s location is not one of them, and if she knows anything, she is damned well going to tell him.

“There are rumours.” She looks down at her hands. “Vampires in the woods on the Eastern Front. The Germans are terrified.”

“Did you send him there?”

“I didn’t stop him, and I knew his intentions.”

“Well, we need him here now,” James says. “If I don’t get to choose where I am fighting this war from, neither does he.”

“It’s his family, James,” Helen says.

“And what are we?” James asks. “Does he honestly think he’s doing better becoming some children’s nightmare than he could do working with me?”

“You just want a secure communications device so you don’t have to go to Portsmouth.”

“That is true,” James admits, “but he should still be here. Have you written him yet?”

Helen pauses before she answers. James has written, of course, and he’s pretty sure Nigel has sent Nikola some sort of communication as well. They have their ways, after all. If Helen hasn’t written, she’ll have to have a good reason.

“If I ask him, he’ll come,” she says at length. “He’ll come, and they’ll put him under lock and key, and he’ll hate it.”

“He won’t hate you,” James points out.

“I know that,” she says. “It almost makes it worse.”

“Send for him, Helen,” James says. “We need him.”

She sighs, and then reaches into the desk for a letter that’s already written. He’s not surprised. She seals the envelope with wax, pressing the Roman numeral for five into the hot liquid just before it dries. He wonders which of their abnormal allies she will task with this, and then decides he doesn’t want to know. If he doesn’t know, he can’t pass the information to Whitehall, and he knows that Helen keeps some of her abnormals secret for their own protection.

“What about the basement?” he says as softly as he can. He takes her hand and squeezes it. She presses her other hand to the machine that sits on his chest.

“It will be fine,” she says, but her eyes are hard.

He knows what’s kept down there, in a box built by Nikola and locked by Nigel. It’s been waiting since 1888, and it’s been safe so far, but Helen does not like to leave it.

“It will be fine,” she says again, and this time he nearly believes her.

“Then I suppose we should pack,” he says.

It isn’t that simple, of course. Eisenhower and Churchill both send over men to help, conceivably to carry heavy objects, but really to keep an eye on them. Helen absolutely detests that kind of scrutiny, and the fact that she’s willing to bear it indicates how she feels about her contributions to the war effort. James is fairly certain that none of the men who push her around realize that she will take it out of their hides when the fighting is done. He rather hopes they’re all still around so that he can watch.

Nigel makes endless lists, cataloguing what goes into each box. When it comes to his plans for the weather machine, something he’s only mentioned to Helen in passing, James puts it into a carton without a second thought, noting only that the carton itself is packed into a truck alongside the others.

“James, when you’ve a moment,” Nigel says from the corner of what used to be James’s laboratory and is now mostly an empty room. “There are some chaps for you to meet.”

Three uniformed men stand with Nigel. Griffin had the easiest time acclimating to the Americans, presumably thanks to his endeavours during prohibition. He’s been pardoned for that, of course. Helen arranged for it with FDR before agreeing to ask Nigel if he wanted to serve as an intelligence officer again, and the American President was smart enough to take her offer. James is glad of Nigel’s involvement, particularly because it means he rarely has to deal with anyone besides Helen himself.

“Yes,” he says, once he’s across the room.

“These are all lieutenants who have been assigned to us,” Nigel says, indicating the three men.

“Assigned to us for what?” James asks.

“Whatever you need, sir,” one of them says. He’s so young that James can barely stand to look at him. “General Eisenhower wants to make sure that you have people on hand for errands, requisitions, that sort of thing. People who understand the system.”

“The system?” James has found over the years that asking frivolous questions is the best way to get a person to reveal more information than he is supposed to.

“Yes, sir,” says the lieutenant. He smiles and James fights down the urge to laugh in his face. “We’re assigned for the duration. And I must say, sir, that it’s an honour.”

The other two are nodding earnestly, and James can tell that Nigel is fighting off a grin as well, so he merely nods and says something inane like “Excellent, you can start by finishing the loading process,” before retreating to the privacy of his study. Nigel arrives a few moments after, and by that time, James has already poured two drinks.

“Helen is going to be thrilled,” he says, passing Nigel a glass.

“It doesn’t matter,” Nigel says. “We’ll foist all three of them off on Nikola as soon as he gets here. He always loves having an entourage.”

“I’m not sure they’re his type,” James says.

“I’m not sure I care,” Nigel says. “So long as he gets them out from under my feet. He’ll probably terrorize them for a week and then they’ll request reassignment.”

“I don’t know,” James says. “The one that spoke seems very determined.”

“We’ve managed with worse.” Nigel sips at his drink politely, but it’s clear he misses the days when a man could simply shoot whiskey and be guaranteed another glass.

“They move us, they spy on us, they give us annoying flunkies…” James trails off. “Helen is going to own their souls by the time we’re done.”

“I know,” Nigel laughs. “It’s one of the reasons I plan to survive.”

“I’ll drink to that,” James says, and lifts his glass.

* * *

Lieutenant Hallman stands with his back to the wall and pretends very hard that he is not actually there at all. It’s not a requirement, his presence at this meeting is authorized, and he’s not even convinced that those in the conversation would be less forthcoming if they remembered he was there, but it is good practice. Half of his job entails following Magnus and Watson around, ensuring they are always where they need to be. The other half of his job involves reporting everything he picks up back at the Nazi high command. Someday, a little stealth might come in handy, so he practices.

His first objective is to ensure that Professor Tesla is returned to England, and the gilded cage that undoubtedly awaits him there. Hallman has chosen a circuitous route to achieve that end, but he hopes that command will be impressed with his initiative. It was easy not to volunteer for the truck, easy to make sure he travelled with Magnus and the other by train. And it was easy to lift the box off the truck bed when no one was looking and leave it for a dead drop once it was outside of the Sanctuary.

Eisenhower wants Watson close by, and that means Magnus and Griffin as well. It couldn’t have been more convenient to Hallman if Ike had asked for his opinion. The Reich hadn’t been able to get anyone into the Sanctuary, and they’d been trying since the early 30s, once they realized how much time Dr. Watson was spending in Berlin. Nothing had worked. Whatever Helen Magnus did, she inspired absolute loyalty, and none of their human or abnormal allies had got anywhere close to anything important before they turned.

And so Hallman came to the front line of espionage, an American who is qualified enough to be assigned as an aide, and at Eisenhower’s wish, no less. It’s so perfect, Hallman had been afraid it was a trap, but he’s been in and out of the Sanctuary for a week before today, and though Watson doesn’t trust him, it’s the distrust of an old man who doesn’t like to be ordered around.

When the box is placed in his hands, the one that holds the schematics for a machine he doesn’t fully understand, he smiles at the abnormal who hands it to him, though on the inside he’s put off by the thing’s appearance. The most important thing in his job is to smile, no matter what. The second is to know when to disappear. Once the truck is loaded and the box deposited, he could disappear if he wanted to, but there is Tesla to retrieve, and that involves being on the train, so he boards, and then he finds himself in a carriage with his targets.

They’re a bit arrogant, which is to be expected, and don’t censor themselves at all in the presence of their aides. It’s reassuring.

“Have you sent for him, then?” Griffin says. Hallman wonders what an invisible man looks like when he’s bleeding. If all goes well, he’ll find out.

“I have,” says Magnus. She is difficult to read and Hallman knows better than to try to play her. If there is a weakness in them, it is not in her. He will have to break the others.

“How long do you think it will take him?” asks Watson, the real danger. If there is anyone who might figure him out, it’s the man rumoured to have inspired Sherlock Holmes.

“My courier will take three days, assuming she doesn’t run into trouble,” Magnus says. “And then he’ll have to actually get the message. After that, I would say three days, if he decides to come.”

“He’ll come,” Griffin says.

“I know,” Magnus replies.

Professor Tesla. The man who is behind the vampires rumoured to be terrorizing the Serbian woods, if he is a man at all. Since his death supposedly occurred more than half a year ago, Hallman has his doubts. It took him less than ten minutes to decide that securing Professor Tesla’s return would be the single greatest thing he could do for the Reich, and not because it will stop him from killing soldiers on the Eastern Front. Watson and Magnus will talk to one another. Griffin doesn’t know anything worth sharing. But Tesla, if the rumours are true, Tesla will talk to anyone who stands still and doesn’t interrupt him.

“I don’t like to be removed from my contacts at this time,” Watson is saying as Hallman returns his attention to the conversation.

“We’ll have to shift our focus, is all,” Griffin says. “Maybe I’ll start being useful.”

“Nigel,” Magnus says, and Hallman notes the fondness in her tone. She might be sleeping with Watson, but that doesn’t mean all her affections are focused on him.

“I don’t mind,” Griffin says with an easy smile. “It makes me harder to tie down.”

Watson shifts uncomfortably on the bench, the outline of the machine that keeps him alive pressing clear lines into his jacket. Hallman would love to get his hands on those plans, be able to deal a death blow and have it look like a mechanical malfunction, but by now he’s starting to believe that the plans exist only in Watson’s not inconsequential mind.

“How will he get from Norway to Portsmouth?” Watson asks.

“I have no idea,” Magnus admits. “But he’s sure to be in a truly foul mood when he gets here.”

“In need of a hug and some hot tea?” Griffin teases. Watson laughs outright, and Magnus cracks a smile.

Hallman doesn’t smile. He’s doing his best to pretend he’s not there. But it’s still the best news he’s heard all day. Professor Tesla is coming back to England, and he’s going to want a friend when he gets here.

* * *

Nikola sinks his teeth into the neck of the young German soldier and wonders if he is ever going to get the taste of terrified Nazi out of his mouth. Autumn has come to Jasenovac, but nothing has changed. The trees around the camp are all dead or cut down for fuel and fence posts. There are no leaves to mark the changing seasons. There is only the chill in the air that heralds another winter the camp’s prisoners may not survive.

Nikola is not strong enough to breach the camp on his own, well, not breach it and then stay alive long enough to do anything meaningful. He’s not sure exactly what it would take to kill him, but he’s very sure that he never wants to find out. He settles to terrorizing the wasteland around the camp, and is darkly pleased when he hears the stories that start to circulate once he begins his attacks.

Still, there is an emptiness to this existence. He is careful not to drink too much of the blood he spills. He doesn’t want to turn into a savage, and he can feel the savagery inside him every time he breaks skin. He just wants them to _stop_. And that is not going to happen unless he scares them so badly that they go running back to Germany and take their anti-Serb sentiments with them.

When Helen had put him in the lifeboat and sent him into his fake death, he had never hesitated on the road that led him here. He had thought he would be able to handle it. The blood. The death. The despair. But it’s not enough and it’s too much, and he doesn’t know what else he can do, if he wants to survive doing it.

And he wants to survive. He wants to see how long his lifespan is, not waste it in this man-made desolation. He is here because he can think of nothing else to do, no other way to help, but what he wants, more than anything, is to be rescued.

James has sent for him, and Nigel as well. James wants help inventing a method of communication the Nazis can’t detect. Nigel just wants him to be safe and sane. Nikola has ignored them both. He won’t take patronizing from either of them. He’s had an offer from John as well, very early on in his bloody campaign, an offer to ally with him. He’s ignored it since it arrived, but with the weather turning cool, he’s forced to admit that the two of them, _especially_ the two of them, could get the job done. The next time John extends a helping hand, Nikola will take it.

He reaches the house where he’s stashed what few remnants of civilization he still clings to. There are three bottles of wine that he keeps not drinking on the grounds that he hasn’t earned them yet, a good suit in a plastic bag in case he ever wishes to return anywhere that such attire would be required, and a wooden box, where he keeps what little correspondence he receives. The pale corner of a piece of paper is protruding from the box. He has mail.

The predator in him is immediately on high alert, scanning for signs of where the intruder came from, _what_ the intruder is. Whatever bore the message is long gone, of course, but if Nikola can figure out who brought it, he’ll be a step closer to figuring out who sent it, and if he can do that before he’s opened the note, then maybe he hasn’t lost whatever brain function he has to the rage of a man whose ethnicity is being systematically butchered.

There’s a line of salt on the window ledge that hadn’t been there when he left on his last raid. If he had a magnifying glass, he’d be able to see the tiny footprints, but he doesn’t, and so all he can see is the line left by a frightened Cornish Pixie who stopped to kiss the glass for luck before flying back to England. Helen, then.

Nikola smiles and reaches for the catch on the box. She hasn’t sent him anything since he kissed her on the deck of the ship she commandeered to guarantee his safe escape from England. And now she is sending him a letter to bring him back.

Her letter is honest, which he appreciates. She does not sugar coat the situation to which he will be submitting himself when he agrees to her request. She does him the courtesy of wording it like it’s not an obligation to her, not a sign of his affections, but they all know how this game is played. Helen says ‘jump’ and they are all in the air before they look to see where they’ll be landing when they come down.

At the bottom of the box is the last of his medication, that which renders him safe for civilized company. He hates her a little bit for taking him away from this, this immediate and pointless revenge. Perhaps it’s for the best he never matched up with Johnny. He’s turning badly enough on his own. He’s walking into a cage, but at least he knows it, and Helen knows it too. And if James really does need him, that means the war is going so badly that staying here and picking off Germans one at a time is meaningless anyway.

Nikola swallows his pills and calls to mind the last time he saw a deer or a rabbit so he has something to wash the medication down with. He can’t keep the grimace off his face, but he did make Helen a promise, and it serves his purpose right now to keep it. If he runs, he can be in Norway in three days, and then there’s nothing but the ocean between him and England.

The bag is waterproof. He can change when he gets there.

* * *

“What do you mean ‘something is missing?’” Nigel asks. “How can it be missing? It can’t have just fallen off the back of the truck. We’d have noticed.”

“Would we?” James says. “Would we have noticed? From where we were on the train?”

“It might have been sent up to quarters,” Nigel says, but James can tell he’s reaching the same conclusions that James already reached.

“We’ll check,” James say. “Have one of the aides do it.”

“No,” Nigel says, hardening. “I’ll do it myself.”

It’s easy to forget Nigel sometimes. James knows he does it on purpose, fading into the background and pretending to take a backseat to the greater minds in the room. It’s been his greatest weapon since before they injected themselves with the Source Blood, and now that Nigel can actually become invisible, the weapon is all the more potent. But the chemist is no slouch, even when held up against Helen, James and Nikola, and he is good at a great many things at which they are not.

“I’ll send for Helen,” James says, and begins to write a note.

It’s bad enough that they are compromised already, but the loss of the weather machine could be catastrophic. If the Germans get their hands on it, not only will they know an invasion plan is in the works, they’ll also have a way to deflect any ships crossing the Channel using the same means James would have used to ensure their safety.

Not to mention it’s a terrible start to their stay in Portsmouth. They’ve not been in their office for two hours yet, and already there is a leak somewhere. James curses under his breath, frustrated with his own stupidity for not insisting that one of them accompany the truck, for not insisting that one of them oversee all the packing, for not insisting that they all stay in London, and hang secure communications. It’s his fault, it’s everyone’s fault, and that’s just stupid.

Helen pushes the door open and comes into the office. She’s carrying a tea tray, they haven’t eaten since breakfast, and when she sees that Nigel is out, she sets the tray down on the table without a word. She crosses the room and, still without speaking, kisses James full on the mouth. His eyes widen in surprise, and over her shoulder he sees the aide, the keen one, he’s _really_ going to have to learn their names, start to follow her into the room and then backtrack, pulling the door shut behind him. At least he doesn’t wink.

Helen senses his distraction and pulls back. His grin is apologetic, and he takes her hands, pressing kisses against her knuckles, and just savouring this last moment of sanity completely to himself.

“What is it?” she asks, and the moment is over.

“It’s the weather machine,” he says. “The plans are gone.”

* * *

“Doctor Watson, let me be sure I’ve understood correctly,” Eisenhower says. “You built a machine that can control the weather? And it works?”

“You misunderstand me, General,” James says. “I haven’t built it. I’ve designed it. But yes, if completed to my specifications, it will work.”

“Why?” Eisenhower demands. “Why in the name of all that’s holy would you even try something like that?”

“Unless I have very much missed my guess, you are planning to invade Europe,” James says. “In which case, you will need to cross the Channel. And let me tell you, as an Englishman to a visitor, the weather in the Channel will scuttle any attempt you make, unless there is a way to control it.”

“Do I even want to know what else you have invented?” Eisenhower asks.

James feels the weight of the machine against his chest, remembers hours of fast talking and tries very hard not to think of Nikola’s Death Ray.

“No, sir,” he says. “You do not.”

“All right, what’s the worst case scenario?” Eisenhower asks.

“The Germans will build the machine based on James’s specifications, wait for us to launch and then unleash a storm of Biblical proportions on our fleet,” Helen says.

“That is unacceptable,” Eisenhower says. “Can you build another one here in Portsmouth, Dr. Watson? From memory? And then counteract whatever the Germans do with their model?”

“Sir, we weren’t even sure what one weather machine could do, in terms of long range fallout,” James says. “I really don’t think the answer is to build a hypothetical second.”

“Why can’t we just go get them?” Nigel says.

“Just go get them?” James repeats, slightly scandalized.

“Well obviously it’s more complicated than that,” Nigel admits, “but why don’t we just wait for Nikola to get here, and then the three of us will go find the plans.”

“Absolutely not!” Eisenhower slams his fist into the table, rattling the cups in their saucers, but Helen is unperturbed.

“I agree,” she says. When Nigel starts to protest, she holds up a hand to block him. “Nigel, General, at some point we will be going into the field to get the plans, behind the lines if necessary, but not until we have real intelligence as to their location.”

“They could have it built by then,” Nigel says.

“Then I’ll go with you,” James says.

It hangs in the air for a few moments before Nigel takes it.

“Can you?” he asks, his tone as light as he can make it.

“I’ll have some time to make modifications,” James says. “Assuming it doesn’t detract from my work for the war effort, of course. And if I’m with you, I can break it in such a way that they’ll never be able to repair it.”

“Helen?” says Eisenhower.

“I don’t like it, Ike,” she says, leaning back in her chair. “But right now it’s the best we’ve got.”

“Will Professor Tesla require assistance making landfall?” the General asks.

Nigel snorts. “No, but you should probably have him met and escorted here, or he’ll get distracted at Bletchley Park and you’ll wind up with a code only him and Turing can crack but no way to transmit it.”

“Where’s he going to land?”

“I have no idea,” Helen admits. “He hasn’t replied.”

“You’re just assuming he’s coming?” Eisenhower asks.

“He’s coming,” James says.

“This will probably be the last time I meet with all three of you alone,” Eisenhower says. “After this, it’ll have to go through channels. That’s why we gave you aides.”

“Charming,” Helen says.

“It’s nothing personal,” he says. “It’s just how the White House would like things done.”

“You don’t want to be at our beck and call.” James fixes the American with his best glare. Eisenhower only flinches a bit.

“I don’t, actually,” Eisenhower recovers. “Any more than Churchill does.”

“We’re happy to contribute,” Helen says. “It’s our war too.”

“You’re going to fleece us when this is over, aren’t you?” Eisenhower says it with a wry tone, but James knows he believes it.

“Why General Eisenhower,” Helen protests, at once so much a Victorian lady that James resists the urge to pinch himself to make sure he’s awake.

“Stop, Dr. Magnus,” Eisenhower says. He’s on his feet now and James is willing to call it a strategic retreat. “Save it for the politicians.”

“Oh, I will,” she says.

“Ma’am, Sirs.” Eisenhower salutes, and then turns smartly on his heel and marches from the room, trailed by his aides.

Their own aides are lined up behind them. James has forgotten their names again, and he keeps forgetting they are even present most of the time. That will be harder once they start work in their office. There’s so little space to be had that James is pretty sure they won’t be able to lose a paperclip, much less ignore three whole people.

“All right,” Helen says, all business, and James brings his attention back to the table. “Gentlemen, we have been given a task we are not fond of, but we shall do it. I know we are all accustomed to doing things our own way, in our own time, but that will not be the case for now.”

“We know all that, Helen,” Nigel says.

Helen turns to look at him, and her eyes flicker over her shoulder, back to where the aides are standing, and James understands. They will play the part. They will be reluctant patriots, annoyed to be taken from the work they had been doing and made to perform in a new location and answer to masters other than themselves. That is how Helen will fight the Americans. She will give them exactly what they expect.

Codes within codes, a game within a game. It’s been a long time since James has tried anything this complex, not since he finished with his efforts to smuggle abnormals out of Germany. They don’t know who is watching, so they will pretend that everyone is. The four of them, once Nikola arrives, are the only ones to be trusted with anything personal, with anything vital. That is how they will ensure that once the battle is fought and won that they can walk away and not owe any more than they already do.

Helen did her government’s work once, and it had cost a man his life. She would cost more men more lives this time, but she will do it on her own terms, even if no one realizes that until it’s too late.

“She knows, Nigel,” James says. He locks eyes with Helen and nods because he cannot take her hand across Nigel’s lap. “She’s just telling us where we stand.”

Helen nods back, and they return to their office to get to work.

* * *


	2. Low Pressure Front

**Low Pressure Front** : Typically an indicator that there is bad weather on the horizon.

 _Studies in Betrayal: Codename Kansas_

 _It will be easy, you think, when you get the assignment. He’s just another Serb. American is something you become, like a carpenter or an undertaker. He understands that, like you do. Neither of you can escape the way you were born. So you smile and hold out your hand when you are introduced, and you keep smiling when he doesn’t return the gesture, and you pretend that you had always planned to salute instead._

 _In school, you learned how to catch people who try to do what you are doing. You were very good at that. It’s probably why you were recruited. You weren’t at the top of that class, but you were close to it. You are the best the Reich has got._

 _At first, you think their easy camaraderie with one another will be their undoing. At Bletchley Park, the codebreakers aren’t even allowed to speak to each other at meal times. There are signs everywhere warning that you never know who the traitor might be._ Loose lips sink ships. _They don’t seem to care. It’s a while before you figure out that they could talk all day and you wouldn’t know what was useful and what wasn’t._

 _They talk about amazing creatures and long dead friends, and they don’t talk about a man named John, though you have yet to figure out why. Command is breathing down your neck, as much as it can, wanting more. It’s been almost a week, and all you’ve given them are the schematics for a machine no one is sure will even work. But you’ve nearly figured out how they work._

 _You were right about Tesla. He will be the weak link. He will be your way in. The only problem is that you find yourself liking him on sight, and the more he talks, the more you have second thoughts about what you’re doing. But you don’t stop. You pass along your intel and you watch, waiting for him to give you something so good that High Command will remember you forever._

 _You don’t communicate with the other spies, though you know who a few of them are. You know they might get turned. You know you might get turned. You don’t want to know anything more than you have to, and right now, Nikola Tesla is more than keeping you in trade._

 _He’s just a Serb, after all. And everyone knows what the Reich does to Serbs._

* * *

Nikola comes to Portsmouth in the rain. He’s not so optimistic as to think the water has washed him clean of his sins. Not even the North Sea could do that, and there’s nothing particularly clean about English rain when the country is at war. It will be a long time before he’s lived down what he’s done, done in the name of good, yes, but hardly on the side of the angels.

The suit is wrinkled, but otherwise survived the trip as well as can be expected. He’s not likely to get a new one, as there is a war on, but he left plenty of clothing at Helen’s Sanctuary when he faked his death, and it won’t be too badly out of style yet. He can only hope she’s packed it. Except of course she has. She knew he would come as soon as she called, because she is Helen Magnus and none of them were ever able to refuse her.

The aide who meets him at the train station is distressingly chipper, holding out a hand when Helen introduces him and then pretending he intended a salute the whole time when Nikola does not return the gesture. It hasn’t been that long since he dealt with Americans, but he’s not sure he remembered them being so eager. His America, the one he fought so hard to join, is changing now, the blush of excitement under the new bright lights fading to the harsh starkness of a nation at war. His friends are dead or dying, for the most part, and their children have inherited an entirely different New York. The War of the Currents is ended in banality, and there are more serious fights to be had.

So he sits in the back of the car and flirts mercilessly with Helen, while the aide negotiates traffic and spends an inordinate amount of time watching them in the rear view mirror. Nikola is careful not to meet his gaze, but mentally files away that this boy will have to be watched carefully. He’s clearly either a fan or a fanatic, and Nikola doesn’t want to deal with either unless he has to. Until he gets bored, of course, in which case it will be handy to have a willing ear for which to spin tales.

“This office is entirely too small for me to work in,” Nikola says when Helen shows him to the cramped room. “I’ll barely have space to think in here.”

“We’ve managed well enough so far,” Helen says.

“You mean I share it?” Nikola demands. The aide smothers a grin behind his hand, which is not exactly following protocol. “With all of you?”

“That table is yours entirely.” Helen waves a hand absently at the desk and chair in the corner. “Nigel and I won’t be here very often, but you and James should fare well enough.”

“Yes, because dear Watson and I always do so well in confined quarters.” Nikola is already stealing pencils and chart paper from James’s desk. “I swear to God, Helen, if you tell me it’s because there’s a war on, I am jumping out the window and swimming back to America.”

“We’ve been ordered to shoot you if you try that, sir,” says the aide.

“It might be worth it,” Nikola fires back. “Did they neglect to tell you what I am? I don’t mind, really. If you can figure it out, you might be worthy of fetching my tea.”

“Nikola,” Helen begins, and then gives it up. She doesn’t apologize to the aide though.

“Seriously, is he going to stand there the whole time?” Nikola asks. “How am I going to flirt with you if there’s an audience? I don’t mind of course, but it does change a few things.”

“You’ll have to forgive Nikola, Lieutenant,” Nigel says, breezing through the doorway and taking Nikola’s hand in a vigorous handshake. “He was spared the pressures of a proper English upbringing and has been suffering the lack ever since.”

“My God, Nigel,” Nikola says, but he’s smiling through any feigned indignity. “You have been spending entirely too much time with James.”

“You have no idea,” Nigel breathes, and James follows him into the room.

“How is it holding up, then?” Nikola asks, shooting a piercing glance at his old friend.

“Fine, thank you,” James says. “Though we may wish to talk about it,” he trails a glance at the wall, where his aide and Nigel’s have joined the one that drove Helen to the station, “later.”

“I see,” Nikola says breezily. “Do you have a pen? I’ve been looking at these code ciphers you’ve created and I’m pretty sure I can solve them in ten minutes without a writing implement, but I figure, why tax myself without need? The Germans certainly won’t bother.”

“Do you think you have something better?” James asks.

“James,” Helen says warningly, but it’s too late.

“My dear Watson,” Nikola says. “You speak English, French, Latin, Greek and a rather appalling version of something I believe you intend to pass off as German. I speak all of those plus a few more besides.” His teeth lengthen ever so slightly, but his eyes stay human and the aides don’t notice. “I’m positive that I can think of something better.”

The two of them fell to haggling like horse traders at a market, leaving Nigel and Helen sitting aside. The aides watch with widening eyes, as haggling turns to thinly veiled insults, and then flat out offense, each line delivered with all the precision of a well-aimed bullet.

“You’ll be fine so long as you don’t interrupt them,” Nigel says in an attempt to be reassuring. One of the aides looks to be buying it, but the other two are still pressed as far back against the wall as they can get.

“We could do with some tea though,” Helen says. “It’s probably a three person job, really.”

All three of them look relieved at that, and slink out quietly while James and Nikola continue to take shots at one another.

“Do you think we should tell them that it’s not the code that matters, it’s the transmitter?” Nigel asks.

“And spoil their fun?” Helen says. “Nikola just swam the North Sea and James has been forcibly relocated. It’ll do them good. We’ll break the news to them after they’ve got it out of their systems.”

“You’re the boss,” Nigel says.

“Thank you, Nigel,” Helen replies. “I do like it when someone points that out.”

* * *

The tea is rationed, but not particularly well monitored. It’s not like an army camp, where the quartermaster is responsible for keeping track of everything. It’s a household that happens to be run by military personnel. Someone will notice if things go missing, but there are enough civilians in the house that it will be passed off as a lack of discipline.

So Hallman very carefully steals the tea. It’s easy enough to put into his pockets, and he’ll be careful to shake it out later. On the chance that some makes it all the way to the laundry, it’ll just get washed down the sink. There won’t be enough of it to make that much of a difference to the wash water.

It’s petty and not even all that symbolically original, but it keeps him sharp. Plus, every stereotype he’s ever heard about the Brits liking their tea turns out to be true. With what’s going on in the Far East, there’s bound to be a shortage eventually, and he’s just hastening it along. It won’t be a crushing blow to morale, but it will be an annoyance, a piece of everyday life that they will have to go without. And he’ll have the satisfaction of knowing he’s the one that caused it.

No one drinks the camomile voluntarily, so he leaves it on the shelf.

While he’s filching from the stores, Hallman thinks about what Professor Tesla said. He’s clearly not dead. And he looks a lot younger than the picture High Command has of him. He didn’t just fake his death. He faked his age. He’s as young as the others, probably the youngest actually, but not as young as he looks, and there’s no explanation for that. Hallman doesn’t know why any of them are so well preserved. It’s one of the things he is supposed to find out. He knows that Watson uses the machine to maintain his health, but neither Magnus nor Griffin seem to need anything like that, and if rumours are to be believed, Professor Tesla made the trip from Jasenovac in less than a week, and without using a boat.

Whatever the answer to that question is, Hallman learned something important just now. He’d been right when he guessed that Professor Tesla would be the weak spot. The man had practically volunteered information and then dared Hallman to figure out what he isn’t being told. If he does figure it out, _when_ he figures it out, Tesla will talk even more.

Hallman fills his pockets with dried tea leaves in the pantry, and then heads back into the kitchen where his unknowing comrades are making sandwiches for their charges. Sometimes, his job is almost too easy.

* * *

“Okay, seriously?” Nikola says once the aides have been gone for long enough that he can stop acting. “Where’s your spy?”

“We don’t know, Nikola,” James admits. “Not yet anyway.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be some sort of detective?” Nikola asks mockingly.

“Shut up,” James says. “There are a few other things on my mind.”

“Oh please, tell me there’s a war on,” Nikola says. “I do so love hearing that in your staid London accent. It makes me feel ever so much better about our prospects.”

“We’re working on it, Nikola,” Helen says. “But we’re working on a few other things as well.”

“What do you need me to do?” he asks, serious for the first time.

“Two things, really,” Nigel says. “One, we need a secure method of communication. I don’t know what you’re going to use to build it because we don’t have a lot left, but we hoped you’d come up with something crazy and then we could build it.”

“Your faith is touching,” says Nikola. “What else?”

“We also need you to be yourself,” James says.

“Myself?” Nikola says.

“Arrogant, talkative and brilliant, Nikola,” Helen says. “Do you want me to say it again?”

“Maybe just the last one,” he smiles at her, and then his face stills. “I’m not sure I like being the bait.”

“I’m not sure I like sharing an office with you,” James replies. “We must all make sacrifices.”

“At least mine will be fun,” Nikola says.

“Oh, shut up,” says James. “Start sketching something. When the aides get back, we’ll have to start talking about stupid things like the Caesar Shift and new ways to use the Enigma machine. I hope you can still do two things at once.”

“For you James, I’ll do three,” Nikola smirks.

He already has a familiar glint in his eye, and by the time the tea tray arrives, he’s sketching madly with one hand and waving the other in the air at James while they discuss the merits of various forms of cryptography.

Helen waits for a decent interval, and then quits the room. There’s a very small library on this floor, the staff have been using it for briefings in the mornings but it’s usually clear by now. She’s all the way through the door before she sees him, a man in uniform sitting at the table. He’s looking at a map of Europe in a way that no one ever used to look at maps, and now it seems everyone does, guessing where the borders will be and imagining how many people will die to put them there. He looks up at her and then stands, and she smiles apologetically, looking at his uniform for the markings that will identify him.

“I’m sorry, General Patton,” she says. “I didn’t realize anyone was in here.”

“It’s not a problem, Dr. Magnus,” he says, waving her into a chair. He reseats himself once she’s settled. “Your compatriots sound like interesting men.”

“I’ll tell them to keep it down,” she says.

“But they did,” he says. “When, I assume, the aides were gone and you were saying something that might actually be of value if it were to be overheard.”

“Loose lips and all that,” Helen says.

“Of course,” he says. “Have you ever been to Norway?”

“Once,” she says.

“Why?” he asks.

“I was hunting,” she says, smiling. “With my father.”

“Your father took you hunting in Norway?” Patton says. “That seems a strange thing for a Victorian gentleman to do.”

“My father did many strange things,” Helen says. “And so do I.”

“There’s nothing wrong with a little adventure from time to time,” Patton agrees. “It makes you quick on your feet. Did you catch it? Whatever it was you were after?”

“In a manner of speaking, yes. We did.” Helen smiles at the memory.

“And brought it home for Mother England?”

“After some negotiations, yes,” Helen says. “There were matters of containment to be considered, and our quarry was nervous about a voyage on open sea.”

“It acted restive near water?” asks Patton.

“The creature told us, sir.” Helen straightens in her chair. “It’s still in London you know, if you fancy a visit when this is over. You can ask it yourself.”

“I might do that,” he says, and returns to the map. “Would it know anything about how to invade Norway?”

“It’s already in communication with Churchill,” Helen says. “I’m very good at my job, sir.”

“What is your job, exactly, Dr. Magnus?” he asks.

“Same as yours, General Patton,” she replies, standing. “My job is to win the war.”

* * *

They’re not sharing a room, but their suites have an adjoining door. Whether it’s a quirk of room assignment or the result of someone’s well mean nosiness, she doesn’t know, but it means that she can crawl into bed with him at the end of the day, so she doesn’t really care. They have absolute privacy here, with no fear of being overheard, and she is with someone she absolutely trusts, and if she wins the war in bed, it will not be the strangest thing she has ever done.

“What do you think of Nikola’s plan?” she asks, leaning against his chest. His heart used to beat, like everyone else’s. It ticks now, still rhythmic and reassuring, but so uniquely him that it always makes her smile.

“Magnetism,” he says, sliding fingers through her hair. “I never would have thought of it.”

“You can’t manipulate it,” she points out.

“True enough,” he admits. “Now we just have to build it, put it someplace useful, and make sure the plans don’t fall into the wrong hands.”

“The last one should be easy,” Helen says. “From what I understood, Nikola will be the only one who can work it. He’ll have the master copy here, and control all the incoming and outgoing messages.”

“Wonderful,” James says. “If there’s one thing I adore, it’s being at the mercy of Nikola Tesla.”

“You should be a bit nicer to him, James,” Helen says softly. “He lost a lot.”

“I know,” James says.

They lie in silence, or as close to silence as the house ever gets. There are always people in and out through the night. The war doesn’t stop just because it’s dark. In most cases, it actually intensifies. James’s breathing is louder now, thanks to the machine, and the rise and fall of his chest is no longer the comforting pillow that it once was, but she doesn’t mind it for the sake of closeness. His breath is evening, but that doesn’t mean sleep. It just means that the machine is regulating him when he is at rest.

His fingers are still in her hair, twining strands of it into harmless knots and then undoing them again. He’s seen her through blonde curls, severe styles, complete abandon and now wartime red, and he’s never said which he likes the best. She’s never asked him, and he’s not the type to volunteer the information. It’s one of the reasons she’s in bed with him and not in bed with something else.

She finds his other hand with her own, twining fingers like he’s twined her hair. He’s a comfort to her, a sure partner in uncertain times, and she knows that she is much the same to him. They share the same drive, the same goals, and many of the same fears. And they will do their duty in spite of all of that, in spite of everything they dislike about their current situation. She will do it because it is what’s right, and he will do it because she is. And he will never ask her for anything.

“Do you wonder where he is?”

“All the time.”

* * *

“You’re going to lie to me, aren’t you?” Nikola asks when Helen and James retire for the night and leave him alone with Nigel.

“I’m a terrible liar, mate,” Nigel says. He dismisses the aides with a wave. It’s been a long day and there will be another tomorrow, and they can find their own beds from here. “My plan is always to know as little as possible about what you and the others are doing, and that way I can’t accidentally reveal anything.”

“Nigel Griffin, you are a commanding officer’s dream,” Nikola says. He reaches for one of the wine bottles that came up with dinner and uncorks it with one delicate claw.

“They’ve got to keep me around for some reason,” Nigel says. “And it certainly isn’t my brain.”

“Where’s Johnny?” Nikola pours two glasses like he hasn’t just asked a dangerous question. Nigel doesn’t flinch.

“We haven’t the foggiest,” he says. “Have you heard anything?”

“An offer to join forces,” Nikola says. “I turned him down. But he was probably going to ask me again, and if you hadn’t come calling, I may very well have said yes.”

“What do you think he’s gone and done?” Nigel asks.

“Something foolish, of course,” Nikola says. “You know Johnny.”

“It might be to our benefit to let the aides think he’s a risk,” Nigel says.

“He’s Jack the Ripper,” Nikola says. “He’s a risk.”

“I meant to the war effort,” Nigel says. “Not to some poor sod out for a walk late at night. We should act like he might turn.”

“He won’t turn,” Nikola says.

“You know that,” Nigel says. “And I know that. But you can damn well bet the Americans don’t. We’ve got a spy in here with us, and John’s out there doing God knows what, and if we can convince whoever is spying on us that he’s a threat…”

“It’ll let whatever game he’s playing get farther than his own inevitable lack of planning would get on its own.”

“Something like that, yes,” Nigel says.

“Should we tell Helen?” Nikola asks, holding the glass to his nose and grimacing slightly at the vintage, but then taking a long swallow anyway.

“We probably won’t have to,” Nigel says. “She’s probably saying the exact same thing to James right now.”

“If they’re talking at all,” Nikola says, smirking.

“Honestly, I try not to think about it,” Nigel says. “Once this is over, I am disappearing. I’m going to go far away and settle down someplace where none of you can bother me.”

“Oh, Nigel,” Nikola says fondly. “That’s what you say every time.”

“It’s bound to stick eventually,” he says, and Nikola laughs.

* * *

Colonel Korba stands in the middle of his office, looking down at the plan on his desk. The translators have been at it for a few hours now, changing Dr. Watson’s notations into German and decoding some of the more technical aspects that Watson had seen fit to encrypt. He’s still not entirely sure what he’s looking at, but his engineers assure him that the machine is more than capable of the task for which he had it stolen.

“See anything you like?” comes a voice from behind him. Korba glowers at the desk, but by the time he turns around, his face is carefully neutral.

“I do, Herr Druitt,” he says, saluting. Druitt returns the gesture with a precision that Korba appreciates, even though he knows the sentiment behind it is false. “Come and see what your old friends have been up to.”

Druitt looks carefully at the plans, discerning meaning from the words written in Watson’s hand. Korba watches him carefully, but Druitt shows no emotion at all. For a traitor, he is remarkably blasé.

“Watson has been busy, I see,” is all he says. “Have you figured out what it does yet?”

“We have some ideas,” Korba says. “Was there anything in particular you wanted to discuss, or did you just drop in to see if my eyes were healing properly?”

“I am, of course, very concerned for your health, Colonel,” Druitt says politely. “But I actually had a few questions for you. About Carentan.”

“Please, take a seat,” Korba says, ever the gentleman. It costs him nothing, after all, and it might gain him something beyond measure. “Tea?”

* * *

It’s beautiful, once it’s done. All metal and polished wood, cutlery and floorboards recycled by a master. There are gears and a typewriter, and a spool of narrow paper where the message gets punched out. It’s a miracle of ingenuity. And Nigel has absolutely no idea how it works. He also doesn’t particularly care.

“Can you make the others?” James asks.

“Of course,” Nikola replies. “Can you get them where they need to go?”

“That’s my job, I think,” Nigel says.

“And mine,” says Helen. “Though my route will be much less interesting than Nigel’s will be.”

Helen is only going to Southampton. There are two ships and a submarine which will get the autotypes once Nikola is finished building the others out of what scrap he can scrounge. Nigel has a much harder road. The autotype destined for Norway can be dropped in and picked up by the resistance there, but the one bound for France will have to be deposited by hand, and it’s Nigel who will make the trip.

James is frustrated that he can’t go, but the machine isn’t entirely portable yet, and his work to make it more so has been hampered by the same lack of materials that is slowing Nikola. The aides are all present, ostensibly to hear a list of materials from Nikola. James still can’t remember their names. If he’s honest with himself, he’ll admit that he hasn’t learned them because that way if one of them is the spy, he won’t feel so bad about the inevitable punishment for espionage.

“Wonderful,” says Nikola. “I’ll be glad to have most of you out of my office for a while.”

None of them dignifies that with an answer. James looks shrewdly at Nigel, and then Helen. He decides now is as good a time as any.

“Do be careful when you’re out there.” The words sound false to him, but he knows that if someone is listening, it won’t matter. “If Druitt catches wind of what you’re up to, he could make you very uncomfortable.”

“We’ll be fine, James,” Helen says. “We have to brief Eisenhower. Will you come with us? I hate to interrupt Nikola and you understand how these work better than Nigel or I do.”

That’s a lie, but the aides don’t know it. Helen understands perfectly well, for all she hasn’t the power to work it remotely. James is merely trying to figure out if it’s the aides themselves who are spying or if it is the people to whom they report that are traitorous. It’s frustrating that it’s taking him so long to do this, but he has so much else on his plate that he has trouble keeping all the games straight sometimes. Thankfully, it’s Helen’s primary job to keep score, and she’s keeping them all in line as a result.

“I would be overjoyed to get out of this room,” he says. Nikola rolls his eyes, but doesn’t protest when he’s left alone with the aides.

He sets to fiddling with the detritus from which he’s supposed to construct a technological marvel, and begins a silent count until one of them talks.

“Why is that Druitt fellow such a problem?” The question doesn’t come from the over eager one, which surprises Nikola. Instead it comes from the nearsighted one who refuses to wear glasses to correct the problem. Nikola is still not sure how he made it into the army.

“John Druitt isn’t a problem,” Nikola says, all bluster, just like they expect. “He’s an annoyance.”

“Dr. Magnus and Dr. Watson seem pretty worried about him,” the eager one weighs in. He picks up the tea cups, as though not being useful is a trial to him.

“Helen and James worry too much,” Nikola says. “We haven’t seen hide nor hair of Johnny boy since 1908 when we solved…another problem of national security. We didn’t call it that, of course, but that’s what it was.”

“Is he really smart like Dr. Watson?” the eager one asks. Nikola appreciates that he at least sounds doubtful, and laughs.

“No, Johnny was never the brains of our operation,” he says. “What concerns dear James is John’s particular ability, which is to move simultaneously and without an outside energy source from one place to another.”

“I beg your pardon?” says one of the boring aides.

“He moves at the speed of thought,” Nikola says, fixing him with a glare. The boy cowers in a gratifying way, and Nikola does his very best not to think of German soldiers in the woods at night. “He is in a place, and then he thinks of another place, and then he is there.”

“Like magic?” asks the eager one. Apparently he is not as intelligent as Nikola had hoped he was. He hasn’t, in any case, yet figured out what makes Nikola special.

“No, not like magic,” Nikola says. “It’s perfectly scientific. Just because we can’t explain something doesn’t mean that there isn’t a valid explanation.”

“If you say so, sir,” he says.

“I do,” Nikola says. He returns to his work and begins to count again, waiting for the next question. If he had known that counter intelligence was going to be this boring, he’d have stayed in Serbia.

“But why is he dangerous?”

Nikola turns to face them, pleased to note that one of them takes a half step back. The eager one doesn’t move though. He’s waiting for the answer. Nikola likes him.

“You’ve figured out by now that Nigel inspired the Invisible Man and James is the source of Sherlock Holmes,” he says. “Helen has inspired no legends because, like me, her true persona is so magnificent that it cannot be captured in fiction. Unfortunately the same is true of Montague John Druitt, whom history remembers better as Jack the Ripper.”

“You mean he copied the Ripper?” says the other boring aide.

“No, I mean he used to go down to Whitechapel in the evenings and slit girls’ throats, and when he was done with that, he used to cut them up into little pieces,” Nikola says. “And when we cottoned on to what he was doing, he teleported away, and presumably has been wreaking a quiet havoc across Europe ever since.”

“You haven’t caught him?” The eager one seems surprised that Nikola would let such a thing slide.

“I haven’t tried, really, not for a while,” Nikola says. It’s not precisely true, of course, but it suits him to lie about that right now. “In 1908 we worked together again for a brief time, John even got a pardon out of it. But he’s nutty as a fruitcake and he really, _really_ likes to kill people, and from what I understand, both are qualities that would get him far in the Nazi party if he decided he didn’t mind saluting to the Führer every time he’s in conversation with a fellow officer.”

“You think Druitt is a Nazi?” the first boring aide says.

“I have no idea,” Nikola says. “That’s part of the problem. But if he was a Nazi, we would probably be the last ones to find out.”

He turns his back on them then, because if he says any more he’s going to start lying compulsively, and once he starts that it’s too easy for him to screw up. He’s given them more than enough as it is. Whatever Johnny is doing, this will help him, and Nikola can only hope that Helen Magnus is enough to keep his old friend and enemy from going completely off the deep end.

“Go and find more things,” he says instead. “I can’t build another autotype out of horse nails and old boots, though you seem determined to see if I can. You,” he says, pointing to one of them at random, “go and get me some tea. Or some wine. Or something.”

“Yes, sir,” they mumble, and then they’re gone.

Nikola peels the black shade back from the window and peers out at the harbour. There are ships there, black against the uneasy sea, and the sky is ominous above them.

* * *

Colonel Korba stands in a bunker outside of Carentan, and looks at what his engineers have wrought. It’s metal and gears, made from melted tanks and other things they stole from the French, taking what was theirs by right as the conquerors of a weaker nation. Korba understands how it works, if not why it works, but in truth, he doesn’t care about either so long as the engineers can _keep_ it working. And they have promised him they can.

“Impressive,” says Druitt, who walked into the bunker beside him, like a normal human instead of the abomination that he is. “I’m sure James will be glad to know it works, if any of his spies make it back to him alive with the news.”

“We do our best,” Korba says. He nods, and one of the engineers throws a switch.

A hum fills the cavern, and then there is a warm wind blowing softly past them, when above the ground it is rainy and cold.

“Bring the creature,” Korba orders, and three of his men come forward, labouring to push a large box. “Open it,” he says.

They hesitate, and he can’t really blame them. These men were with him when he captured the creature, after all, in North Africa last year. They saw what happened to his eyes, how the creature has marked him forever. But he’s learned so much since then, what the creature is and what it can do, and he is no longer afraid of any of the abominations that God allowed to exist on this Earth. He is no longer afraid because the Reich gives him the power to destroy that which he cannot use, and because he has given himself the power to use what before he could not control.

So he walks to the box, and throws the latch while his men stand back and let him take the risk. He is the commander, and it is his job. He has paid the price already, and the creature will take nothing else from him. He has decided it will be so.

The bunker is suddenly full of fire, and everyone but Korba and Druitt flinches away from the heat. But then the weather machine whines to a higher setting, pulling the creature under its control and sucking it into the cave that had been prepared for it. German ingenuity has once again triumphed over nature, in more ways than one, and Korba watches from behind his glasses with an expression of pride on his face.

“Do you think your Watson ever dreamed his invention would have this much power?” he asks Druitt.

“There are a lot of things James doesn’t dream of,” Druitt says. “He was never particularly fanciful.”

“Then I am even more glad we took it from him,” Korba says. “A man who cannot see all ends is not worthy to possess such a marvel.”

“It is a marvel,” Druitt says.

They stand staring at the fire elemental for a long time, then. Korba has no idea what Druitt is thinking, and to be honest, he doesn’t care. He knows only that either way, he has won this game. Either Druitt will not betray him, and the machine will power the greatest weapon ever made, or Druitt will betray him, and in doing so will deliver Dr. Watson and Dr. Magnus, and with them, the secret to the near immortality that all three of them seem to enjoy.

He smiles, and the fire burns.

* * *


	3. Seiche Wave

**Seiche Wave** : A wave of some magnitude in a contained body of water.

 _Studies in Betrayal: Like a Lodestone to the North_

 _He has always been the wild card in your plan, the murderer you cannot control. You’ve made arrangements, though. And you’re not overly concerned. A bullet will still hit him, and if you fire on him, he might be wise enough to stay away. You’ve already given your perfect eyesight to the Reich. You are not afraid to risk your personal safety to the same end._

 _That doesn’t mean you’re stupid, though. You take precautions. You filter through every piece of paper your American-made spy steals for you, combing through the information until you find the note that suits your need. Apparently you are not the only one to be concerned about John Druitt. James Watson shares your fear, and he wrote something down as a speculation that you are more than willing to field test._

 _You suspected Druitt from the outset. You have more than one disillusioned Englishman on your payroll, and you will use them to win the war, but he was different. He wasn’t content to pass you information, he wanted in. He wanted the uniform. There is something not quite right about that._

 _You cannot fault his ferocity. The years have made him an excellent killer, and if you could trust his loyalty, he would be your most able lieutenant, but you had doubts long before that night at the opera, and killing Hitler just confirmed what you had always suspected. John Druitt is not on your side._

 _He might be the next best thing, though. He might hate Helen Magnus and James Watson enough to destroy their country just to watch them burn along with it. You’re not sure that’s precisely it either, of course, but it’s your best guess. You don’t doubt he’ll do his best to bring the two of them to Carentan, either to help them or to kill them himself. You don’t stop him._

 _Your work with abnormals has provided interesting side benefits, beyond the weaponization of the being that cost you your eyes. Those who could speak the tongues of men, those whose abomination made them a true mockery of mankind, those whom you tortured, spoke of Helen Magnus as though she were a kind of saint, and they spoke of James Watson as a saviour, rescuing them from a country that tried to end their existence. That alone would make you want them, but there is more._

 _Some of the creatures have long lifespans. Some have lived for half a century, or more. And the oldest of these speak of Helen Magnus and James Watson, and of when a Queen ruled England. They are older than they look. They have lived longer than they should. And they do not appear to have paid any price for it, unlike Druitt who is mad and will be put down the moment he is no longer useful. Tesla is beyond your reach and all signs indicate that Griffin would be next to useless anyway, but Watson and Magnus have the answers you seek, and you are going to ask them questions, even if you have to destroy a hundred insignificant French villages to do it._

 _And it starts with lodestone, and the unknowing betrayal of an old friend._

* * *

James stands next to the window, the shade open to the pale light of the dawn, looking down at the Channel. The morning light is faint, and if he does not miss his guess, will soon be swallowed by the clouds that wreath the sky. He should close the window, but aside from the clouds, the sky is clear, and it’s been a while since he’s looked outside.

“Do you think they’ve built it?” Helen says. She’s sitting on the edge of the bed brushing her hair. This style is too short to braid effectively, and James can honestly say that makes him a little bit happy, but she’s never consulted him on the matter, so he says nothing.

“It rains a lot in Portsmouth,” he says in reply, not turning to look at her. The brush makes a quiet noise against her hair, and he likes it because it means the rest of the house is at peace, if only for a moment.

“Eisenhower is going to send them, you know,” she says, “whether the sky is clear or not.”

“I know,” he says. “And it’s not the sky I’m worried about.”

The beaches of Normandy are easy enough to land on in fair weather. In the dark and if the sea swells, it is an entirely different matter.

“They are doing everything they can, James,” she says. “They’re destroying radio listening posts from Calais up the coast of Norway. Patton has been given an entire army that doesn’t exist. Fortitude isn’t written on a single document, and I don’t even remember the last time I heard someone say it aloud when they weren’t completely secure.”

“I made half of those recommendations myself,” James says. He lets the blackout curtain fall back against the window pane and turns towards her. “I just hate the waiting.”

“Yes, because you have nothing to do to keep yourself busy,” she says fondly.

He smiles, and crosses to her. He takes her hands and kisses her palms and doesn’t stop her when she takes his face between her hands and pulls his lips to hers. One of her hands slides across his cheek and then down to rest on the top of the machine that whirs and ticks against his chest. He straightens and pulls away from her.

“James,” she says, and he knows that she is only glad he is alive, though she knows how much he hates his infirmity.

“I will be ready,” he says. “When we go, I will be ready.”

“Nikola has found the time to help you?” Helen asks.

“Yes,” James says. “We finished the plans while you were in Southampton. It’s merely a matter of construction now.”

He begins to dress and she watches patiently until he gets to the cravat. What had before been a stylistic holdover of his youth has become another way of concealing himself from the world. The carefully knotted fabric hides the tubing when his shirt is done up, and conceals the shape that protrudes from his chest. Eventually, he knows, even more tubing will be required. He will wear a cravat every day for the rest of his life.

Helen takes over halfway through the knot, her hands moving surely over the fabric, and then smoothing down his chest. She has never minded the machine, and he is glad of that. It makes it easier to be comfortable in his own skin.

“Well then,” she says. “Nigel and I will do our best to stay out of your way.”

“Leave us one of the aides,” he says. “The other two can tail you all day.”

“You do know they have names, right?” she asks. “Names that you have been told and have probably remembered.”

“I do know,” he tells her, because lying to Helen Magnus is not something he ever plans to do. There are things he won’t tell her, but he will never, ever lie. “I choose not to use them.”

“I understand, darling,” she says, because she does. “It will be over soon.”

“It might not happen at all if your Patton can’t keep his temper under control.”

“He’s not my Patton,” she says, but she’s laughing, because she knows he is. She’s owned them all since they made her move here. The smart ones have figured it out. “I have to go and dress.”

Helen walks into her room and dresses quickly. She could wear a skirt, like the American and British army women do, but she decided a long time ago that she would wear trousers when she can, and so she does. Her hair is completely frivolous; she should either cut it off or consign it to a severe style, but she finds herself reluctant to do either. If she could chase sphinx cubs with Victorian curls, not to mention a corset, she is certain she can deal with shoulder length hair. There aren’t too many frivolities nowadays, at any rate, and she has always been good at taking what she can get.

This war has been different. She spent most of the last one in the trenches performing surgery. Her agreement with the government was still new, and they didn’t really appreciate what she and her people were capable of. Nigel ended that. He had volunteered as a spy, and when they realized how he was getting his information, the government had become aware of the full power they had in their hands. After the armistice was signed, she had come upon James staring at a map of Europe in a way that was all too familiar now, and when he told her the fighting wasn’t over, she believed him and started to prepare.

This time, her abnormals are on the front lines, gathering information and supporting the war effort as best they can. There are a few beings she didn’t tell the government about, mostly those who would be useful as adults but are too young to risk right now. And she, James and Nigel found themselves involved in the planning and execution of strategy. To be honest, it is something of a rush, and it certainly beats life in the trenches, but she finds herself wishing more and more often that she’d told the government to go hang itself when they offered her money. After the war is done, she is going to change how things are done.

She is not entirely sure how, yet, but she has amassed any number of favours over the past few years, and when she cashes in for what she’s owed, even after taking a deduction for how she got Nikola off the hook for his Death Ray, she’ll have more than enough pull to be completely independent, and still remain absolutely necessary to government operations.

She’s the last to arrive at breakfast, and the toast is cold when she gets there. Nikola makes some entirely too predictable joke that she doesn’t dignify with a response. The aides have stopped flinching every time one of them snipes at the others, and Helen knows it’s because Nikola tells them stories when Helen and James are out of the room. They’ve wagered a lot on Nikola’s seeming innocence, and she hopes that it won’t destroy their schemes or what’s left of his sanity.

“Good morning, Nigel,” she says. “How was France?”

“Cold,” he says. “And very wet.”

“That’s unseasonable,” Nikola says. He manages to make it sound like an insult, but James doesn’t rise to the bait.

“See anything you like?” Helen asks.

“Not a soul,” Nigel says. “I was in and out, and no one was around to remark on my quality evasion skills.”

“That’s too bad,” Nikola says. “I’m sure you’ll do better next time.”

“If we ever go back to France,” Helen says. “I’ve got a meeting with Patton again today, and all he ever wants to talk about is the hunting trip my father and I went on to Norway half a century ago. It’s tedious and I don’t care for skiing.”

“There’s more to Norway than skiing,” James says.

“Yes, there’s tobogganing as well,” Nikola adds. “I’ve heard it’s bracing.”

“Are you going to go and look at the exhibit later?” Nigel asks. “The aides were telling me about it while I was waiting for you lot to come down for breakfast.”

“What exhibit?” asks James.

“Some morale thing they’re doing,” Nigel says. “On account of how no one can take decent vacations anymore.”

“Do you remember the time we went to Rome?” Nikola says dreamily. “And we forgot that there would be other people there too? Remember the nuns?”

“Hush,” says James. “What are you talking about Nigel?”

“The office of…something, had all these people send in photographs of vacations they’d taken in the French countryside,” Nigel explains. “The idea is that you go look at the photos and it reminds you of how much you hate the war.”

“I’m almost positive that’s not the intent, sir,” says the eager aide, but no one pays him any attention.

“It sounds fascinating,” Helen says, spreading inferior jam on cold toast. “We should go over and take a look after lunch.”

“I’m still not allowed to leave the building,” groused Nikola.

“That’s no one’s fault but yours,” James says wickedly. “We’ll send you a photo.”

Nikola bares his teeth in response, and two of the aides find pressing excuses to leave the room. The third one stays, though, standing straight with his back to the wall. He’s smiling, too. Like he’s won a prize.

* * *

“I’ve figured it out, Professor Tesla,” Hallman says, the first time he gets Tesla alone after breakfast.

“What have you figured out, Lieutenant?” Tesla asks. “I hope it’s not the invasion. That information hasn’t even been leaked to the generals yet.”

“Not that, sir,” Hallman says. “I’ve figured you out.”

“You know, I’ve had more than a few people tell me that, over the years.” Tesla is fidgeting, which would be annoying if he didn’t have a tendency to talk as much as he moves. Now he is fiddling with a small electrical gadget that will, apparently, make it possible for Dr. Watson to move about with greater ease, and also survive the trip to France, should things go awry en route.

“I kind of can’t believe I’m saying it out loud, to be honest,” Hallman says. “If I tried to tell anyone else, they’d probably say I was crazy.”

“The most interesting people are,” Tesla says carelessly. He turns around and spreads his hands wide. “Tell me about myself.”

“You’re a vampire,” Hallman says. “You never get drunk, you don’t eat or sleep as much as the others, and Dr. Magnus asks you about your medication all the time, except I know you aren’t sick.”

“Congratulations, lieutenant,” Tesla says. “But you’re only half right. I am, unfortunately, half human. Only part of me is vampire, but I promise you, it’s all the important parts.”

“If you bite me, will I turn into a vampire?” Hallman asks.

“Why is that always everyone’s first question, I wonder?” Nikola says, turning back to the gears on his desk. “People are so unimaginative.”

“Is that why you can’t go out?” Hallman asks. “Because the sunlight will kill you?”

“Lieutenant, was it raining when I got here?” Nikola asks in a disparaging tone. “And do you think at some point in my journey here from…where I was before it stayed dark and cloudy the entire time?”

“Good point, sir,” Hallman says. “What about garlic? Holy water? A stake?”

“God, I hate literature sometimes,” he says. “No, no and no. Well, probably not. I’m not really inclined to experiment with that sort of thing. I did get clawed by a manticore once, though. And there was something about a dragon, but I don’t like to brag.”

“Sir, I’m not entirely sure I believe you,” Hallman says.

“You know, that might be the cleverest thing you’ve said yet,” Nikola says. He delicately licks the tip of his index finger, and then there is an arc of sparks between his hand and the gadget on his desk. After a slight crackle, it hums to life. “But I think you’ve earned a story.”

Hallman does his very best not to smile.

* * *

“The Germans can’t possibly believe that this is a museum exhibit,” James says, glaring at a lovely photograph of the French coast near Calais.

“Probably not, if you keep grumbling about it,” Nigel says. “James, they’ve done a good job. There are pictures here from all over, and they’re not even organized all that well. Unless you know what you’re looking for, you wouldn’t know what’s missing.”

“And there are more than a few things missing,” Helen says. “It’s no worse than your idea about the radar stations.”

“I don’t like that there are so many pictures,” James says.

“If they’re going to be here, we might as well use them,” Nigel says. “I’ve been keeping an eye on the technology. They’re only getting better. Someday, they’re not going to need us at all. Just photos of where they’re going.”

“Let’s go look at Norway for a while,” Helen says. “I’m supposed to be an expert, after all, and I’ve only been there once.”

“I think Patton just likes having you in the room,” Nigel says. “It gives him something to do.”

“Shut up,” Helen says. “The First US Army Group takes up a lot of his time. He’s been giving speeches day in and day out for a week.”

“It must be exhausting,” James says. Only those who know him best would hear the complete sarcasm in his words. The First Army Group is entirely fictional, which is a waste of Patton’s talents in James’s opinion, but he was not consulted on the matter.

“It keeps him busy,” Helen says.

One of the aides comes into the room and goes to Nigel. They nearly always do, when given the option. He is less threatening than Helen, and he’s managed to parlay his stories of being a rumrunner into something that makes him sound approachable rather than like a gang kingpin. Of course, James had attended some of those parties, so he knows it’s all a carefully crafted lie. Nigel can be as ruthless as the rest of them when you’re between him and what he wants, and James has never met a man with a more creative hand to poison. He supposes it’s Nigel’s way of preparing for a quiet retirement somewhere in the countryside, and right now it suits their purpose for him to be the friendly one. The aide passes him a note, and he reads it quickly.

“They need us back at headquarters,” he says brusquely. “Something about a change in the weather.”

* * *

“Carentan?” James says. “Are you quite sure?”

“Yes,” says Patton. “That’s what the leak said in any case.”

“We’ve made arrangements to transport the three of you to France immediately,” Eisenhower says. “Well, after the dinner tomorrow night.”

“Can we afford to waste that much time?” Helen asks. “I should think that sooner rather than later would be more convenient.”

“It’s too close to target,” Patton says. The aides are in the hallway, so they’ve all relaxed slightly. If there is a traitor in Patton or Eisenhower, they are in more trouble than they can solve with clever misdirection. “We can’t have you that close to Carentan without the risk that it will give away the actual plan.”

“You mean if we’re caught and tortured,” James says dryly.

“It’s a heavily fortified position and considerably dangerous,” Eisenhower says.

“All right,” says Helen, “so we wait until tomorrow after the dinner. Then we go to France, find and destroy the machine, recover the plans and inform you via the autotype that the skies are clear for the invasion.”

“You’ll want to coordinate with the French resistance cells in the area,” Eisenhower says. “They’ll be able to provide you with more weapons than you can carry in your transport.”

“What’s our transport?” Nigel asks.

Patton grins. “Well, you’re taking a sub across, but once you make landfall, we’ve acquired a German tank, and it’s all yours.”

“What happens if we’re stopped?” James asks.

“That’s entirely up to you, Dr. Watson,” Eisenhower says. “How’s your German?”

“I’ll practice,” he says through his teeth. Nigel smothers a grin.

“Excellent,” Eisenhower says. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ve other things to attend to. General, Doctors, Mr. Griffin.”

Eisenhower strode from the room and Patton unrolled a map of Carentan and the surrounding area. He starts to make notations, designating where they are expected to land, where they could find the tank, and what route they should take.

“Don’t you have things to do, General?” Helen asks. “Not that we don’t appreciate it, but we’ve done this a few times by ourselves.”

“I don’t mind,” says Patton. “Besides, the only army I have right now is pretend, which means they move very quickly, are really easy to feed and do exactly what I tell them, which, this morning, was to go swimming.”

“You inspire confidence, General,” James says.

“Not as much as I’d like,” Patton says. “You’ve been holding something back. Or rather, telling us things, but only what you want us to know.”

Helen and James exchange a long look, and James nods. It is more acceptance than permission.

“We were in your charge for less than a week before the plans for the weather machine were stolen,” Helen reminds him. “The Sanctuary was completely secure, and you made us leave it to come here and work for you directly, as though what we had done during the first years of the war was meaningless.”

“For the record, I was against that,” Patton says.

“What she means is that you’ve got a spy, and we don’t like it.” Nigel says.

“Of course we’ve got a spy,” Patton says. “We’ve probably got a dozen. That’s why we’re planning to invade Norway and why I’ve spent the last three weeks looking at vacation pictures of Calais.”

“We never thought it was you, General,” Helen says.

“Thank you,” Patton nods. “I assume you have theories?”

“We’re working on them,” James allows.

“And you’ll tell me when it’s done?”

“I imagine so,” James says.

“Good.” Patton rolls up the map and passes it to Helen. “I’ll see you at dinner tomorrow, then.”

The three of them sit at the table for a few minutes in silence after the second general leaves.

“Why can’t we just turn them in?” Nigel says.

“Because we don’t know which of them it is,” James says. “And if we spook him, we lose the opportunity to share disinformation. A spy you know is far more useful than a spy in custody.”

“I realize that that has been our practice for the war,” Nigel says. “I helped get some of them. But we’re coming down to a wire now, and I’m not sure I want to go running off to France knowing that someone might be telling Hitler I’m about to come calling.”

“We are planning three entirely separate invasions, one of which is entirely clandestine. I can’t think of a more important time for misinformation, but you’re welcome to stay here, if you like,” James says. Nigel bristles, and Helen steps in.

“Gentlemen, enough,” she snaps. “All that matters is getting James to his machine so we can fix this. Let’s go back to Nikola before he says something he’s not supposed to.”

* * *

Every major player sits down to dinner on June 3rd, and James knows absolutely that the spy is in the room. The war office is sure that it has identified and turned all but one German agent, and there is no doubt in James’s mind that the last agent sits at one of the tables in this room.

The conversation is the most inane collection of words James has ever experienced. Beside him, Nigel recites long sections of “The Invisible Man” to men who don’t know that he’s the source for the material, and across the room, Nikola is trying to drink an entire platoon under the table. Everyone there knows that there will be an invasion, but far fewer know where that will be.

James is halfway through explaining the rules of cricket, a somewhat touchy subject about which his nationality has not made him an expert, when Helen finally comes to his rescue.

“Come with me,” she says at a whisper and links her arm in his. “You’re going to want to see this. It will be funny.”

“Truly funny, or funny because it will give aneurisms to half the people in this room?” he whispers back. He moves her hand so that it is more formally placed, how they might have walked if they courted in their youth.

“Bit of both, really.” She’s smirking now, which is never a good sign, but he’s bored out of his mind, and he _hates_ cricket, so he follows her around the outside of the room.

General Patton is there, red-faced and probably not nearly as intoxicated as he looks. He winks at Helen, and then turns to face the room at large. Across the room is another general, one with whom James has not interacted very much. Patton waves exuberantly, and the general looks over, already slightly perturbed.

“I’ll see you in Pas de Calais, Gavin!” Patton yells, and then his aides all but drag him from the room.

“Is he mad?” James hisses in Helen’s ear as the dining room explodes around them.

“It’s entirely possible,” Helen says. “I kind of like him.”

“You would,” James says.

“We have to pack,” Helen says. “And you have to practice with Nikola. Your accent is still atrocious.”

“How would you know?” James demands. “Your German is even worse than mine.”

“My German is excellent,” she says. “It’s just a bit dated.”

“I imagine dinner is pretty much finished,” James says. “I’ll fetch Nigel and Nikola, shall I?”

“I’ll meet you upstairs,” Helen says. She’s laughing as she goes, and James finds that unreasonably attractive for some reason.

* * *

“It’s stupid, Helen, and you know it,” Nikola says. He hasn’t raised his voice, but his eyes are darkening, and that is never a good sign. “It’s stupid for any number of reasons, not the least of which is that I’m the only one of the lot of you that speaks passable German.”

“Nikola,” Helen starts, but he cuts her off.

“I could defend all of you without breaking a sweat, I could get us past checkpoints without having to do anything that would make someone _else_ break a sweat, not to mention that I’ve spent enough time working on the weather machine that if I went, James wouldn’t have to, and we wouldn’t be risking him or the contraption it took all four of us half a decade to invent!”

“Nikola!” Helen says. He flings his hands out in frustration and sits. “You’re not wrong. But we’re under orders. And they need you here, in case something goes wrong with the autotype.”

“Nothing is going to go wrong with the autotype, Helen,” Nikola says.

“She knows that,” Nigel says. “We all know that. But they don’t. All they know is that you built them a machine they can’t understand and have promised them that it’s safe.”

“The part where they think that if they let you out you’ll never come back doesn’t help either,” James says under his breath.

“Thanks,” Nikola says.

Helen pours herself a cup of tea and grimaces, but then drinks it anyway.

“Camomile?” James asks, a vague disgust in his voice.

“Yes, unfortunately,” Helen says. “We really have to fix this.”

“What, China?” Nikola says. “I’ll put it on my list.”

“That would be handy,” Helen says. “We have to go prepare. There are some tests I want to run on James’s machine before we take it into the field.”

“I’m sure there are,” Nikola says in a suggestive tone of voice.

“Nikola,” Nigel berates him gently, but Helen only smirks in return and James rolls his eyes.

“Be careful,” Nikola says. “If you see…if you see him. Shoot first.”

Helen stills and looks at him, completely serious for a moment. “I always do,” she says. It isn’t difficult to believe.

* * *

Lieutenant Hallman is not an idiot. He knows that Calais is a much better place to stage an invasion of France than Norway is to stage an invasion of Europe. Patton’s outburst at dinner hadn’t told him anything he didn’t already know, and that worried him. He’s spent as much time as he could at the photo exhibit, trying to deduce what was missing, what was under-represented, but it hadn’t told him anything worth knowing.

Patton hadn’t helped. Either he was incredibly brash and didn’t care that the world knew he was taking the First US Army Group to Calais, or he was being clumsy, taking them somewhere else and trying to cover his tracks.

Fortunately, Hallman is not paid to figure out what the information meant. He’s only paid to send it. So send it he did, by the usual method. Patton claims Calais, Norway is still on the table, and Magnus and Watson are planning a trip to a tiny French town he’s never heard of called Carentan, and they plan to take Griffin with them. The reply is swift and succinct. He is to stay on Tesla, like a burr, and if necessary prevent him from talking with Eisenhower or any of the other generals once Magnus has gone.

It will be the riskiest thing he’s done so far, more dangerous than stealing the tea, and not just because it could expose him. Leaving aside the physical damage Professor Tesla could do to him if he wanted, there’s also the increasingly distressing fact that Hallman finds the man more and more likable, Serb or no.

There is something he’s missing, and it’s driving him crazy. He’d leaked as much intel on Druitt as he could, and knew that the men in France would be ready for what Magnus had in store for them, but there is something else, something about the invasion that he hadn’t done properly. He would only have so much time. Eisenhower wants June 6th and is determined to get it, and as of June 4th, no one Hallman could pump for information knows where the invasion will be taking place.

Tesla is the key. Hallman would have to put his feelings aside. He would remember his parents and why he had been recruited to this job. He had a duty to the Reich, and Tesla is only a Serb.

* * *

John stands in the dark, shadowed by the wall and the night and his black leather coat. The French are a conquered nation, an occupied nation, and their overlords have not been kind. Still, they are French, and so there is wine. And where there is wine, there are victims.

He can’t hunt as he likes, not when he is, supposedly, an upstanding member of the National Socialist Party, but his proclivities can be useful, in certain circumstances, and it was made clear that he was allowed to utilize them when required. As they are tonight.

It’s a Resistance Cell he stalks tonight, having read a report of their activities in one of the papers on Korba’s desk. There are any number of appropriate targets, most of whom are to his particular taste anyway, but he quells those urges and risks a little rebellion. He might see Helen and James in the next few days, and he’s probably damned enough without adding more innocent blood to his hands. The prey he seeks, therefore, is slightly less than innocent.

If Korba asks, and he never does, John can claim it was an honest mistake. He went to the bar, found the Resistance fighters and chanced to kill the wrong one. But Korba never asks. John will murder tonight, and it will be bloody, but the man he kills has been collaborating with the Germans for weeks now. For money. In John’s day, there was honour in such things as war.

He takes the man behind a public eating house, closed down since the Germans came to town. A hand on his coat, and they are in Whitechapel, where John has always felt at home. The man prays to God in French, not understanding what has happened, and John slits his throat in the same alleyway where he ended Elizabeth Stride. Her death was interrupted and he’d had to find another, but London is locked down during the night when the country is at war, and he has all the time in the world to make a mess of the collaborator’s body.

He’s back in Carentan and cleaned up long before dawn. Today it will either all go according to plan or it will all fall apart, but in either case, he is ready.

* * *

James takes his time.

The same thoroughness that so frustrates Nikola in the workroom and flusters Nigel when they play cards has been perfected in bed with Helen. It honestly wasn’t what she meant when she said they had to test the machine earlier in the evening, and they did run all the medical tests she thought, as James’s physician, were appropriate. But when they were done, he had paused in re-buttoning his shirt, and reached for her instead.

They have to be quiet, on account of all the people in the house, but that isn’t really a problem for either of them. Nikola has accused them of being practical, and he’s not entirely wrong. Their passion is subdued, but no less fervent for its apparent lack of fire. And on nights like this, there is more fire than usual.

The spectre of death has hovered over them many times. They have always faced it together, on their own terms, even before, when there were others in the picture with them. Whatever else he has been to her over the decades, James has always been her partner, and he is no less so now that she shares his bed.

Tomorrow they will go to France, and they will find the machine and destroy it. Of this, Helen has no doubt. She does not allow it. Tonight, she will let James pretend he is distracting her, that his mouth on her skin makes her stop thinking about Norway, Normandy or Calais, and that his hand between her thighs makes her stop thinking about all the ways the invasion could go wrong. She lets him, because she knows that he is doing the same for himself, and right now, that illusion is all that’s keeping them both sane.

It’s a kind of understanding she’s never had with another lover. It’s one of the things that makes it so easy to go back to James. She hopes it’s one of the reasons he always comes back to her. Right now, none of that matters. They have each other, and they are going to get the job done. Because that is what they do. She never stops thinking that, not even when she arches desperately under his hands, and not even when they’re both spent, and finally on the edge of sleep.

* * *

Nigel wishes that they’d gotten around to inventing something that would turn invisible along with him. He’s talked to all the experts in the field, every crackpot Nikola made contact with in America and few of the more local variety. None of them had anything of use. Fortunately, modesty’s never been much of an issue, but he does get cold, and the weather in France probably hasn’t improved since his last trip there, even though it should be late spring now.

He’ll simply have to wait. He’s sure that if he’s patient, technology will come up with something. If James and Nikola ever sit down after the war ends, they might even have something by the 60s. Nigel’s not exactly holding his breath. He’s had plenty of time to think about dying in the past few years, and he’s more or less decided that this will be his last war. He’s no coward, but he is tired, and it’s not his brain that men commanding armies always seem to want. Espionage is a young man’s game, and Nigel stopped being a young man four kings and a queen ago.

He’s tired. And this will be his last war. But he will do his damndest to make sure they win, and that means once more into the breach. So he’ll go.

* * *

Nikola doesn’t sleep much anymore. Especially on nights like this. Nights like this, when he can feel the lightning in the air.

* * *


	4. Red Flag Warning

**Red Flag Warning** : The warning given for unpredictable winds during wildfire season.

 _Studies in Betrayal: Keep Your Friends Close..._

 _They didn’t tell him everything. Mostly, he’s okay with that. It’s not like he’s told them everything either._

 _Oh, they could guess, and they probably have. Rumours have come all the way to the White Cliffs of the monsters that stalked the forests along the Eastern Front. They are smart enough to figure it out, figure out that there is only one monster and that the monster is you. Helen all but gave you her blessing, but you doubt she realized the ferocity you were capable of. Since the night you injected the Source Blood, they have wondered if there is a monster in you. Now they know._

 _That isn’t why they haven’t told you their plan, though. It’s the oldest ploy in the game. What you don’t know, you can’t reveal, however accidentally, and this has been a war of accidental revelation. They have left you in the middle of a mess: somewhere there is a traitor and since you are forbidden from leaving anyway, it is your task to flush the traitor out._

 _It still galls, though. James has yet to test the limits of his new machine, and behind enemy lines hardly seems the place to do it. If you were there, you would be able to keep them safe. Instead you are stuck in the relative safety of the country that only ever sought to use you and never let you truly belong. When this is over, when they no longer hold the well-being of your friends hostage for your good behaviour, you will not think twice before leaving. There isn’t very much, after all, that can hold you back._

 _The things you don’t know claw at your mind, scrabbling talons against tenuous notions you are puzzling your way through. The information that revealed the location of the weather machine seemed too easily obtained. Helen’s departure had not been quiet enough. It’s been raining for weeks on end. And John Druitt has not been accounted for. There are too many things that could go wrong._

 _You helped Alan Turing break Enigma. You built a machine that does an even better job. Your model sits on James’s desk, waiting patiently to funnel you news, should Helen be able to send any. You do think it a bit odd that the Allies have never sought to weaponize you, but perhaps they disregard the rumours, and since it suited Helen’s purpose to have you here, here you are._

 _There will be an invasion tomorrow. You sit in your office and pretend it’s Norway or Calais. You know very well that it is neither, but secrecy is your life here, the game that everyone has agreed to play. There is one more spy to find, and your list of suspects grows shorter by the hour. Before, it was only idle speculation, conversations you pointedly did not have with Nigel or James. Now, with your friends behind the lines, the urgency cannot be denied._

 _So you make yourself the prey. And you wait._

* * *

Lieutenant Hallman doesn’t know where the invasion will be. Patton’s brash statements notwithstanding, Calais seems unlikely. And Norway seems impractical. He’s poured over the maps, seen the pencil marks that indicate the destruction that the Allied planes have rained down on France over the past few weeks. There seems to be no pattern, no order to the strikes. Radio towers have been blown up from the Atlantic to the North Sea, but there are still only so many places that the Allies can make landfall.

He’s alone with Professor Tesla this morning, and the vampire is agitated about something. When Dr. Magnus and Dr. Watson don’t appear by 9AM, Hallman knows that something is up. He will have to be careful. If Tesla is on tenterhooks, then something very important must be going on. They must have gone on a mission. Suddenly, Hallman knows what is happening, as if he had received an official memo telling him everything he could possibly want to know.

He is absolutely sure that today is the most important day of his life. Watson and Magnus are gone, and unless Hallman has missed his guess, Griffin has gone with them. The invasion will be tonight, or early tomorrow morning, and Magnus is making her play to secure the weather machine before it happens. This is more important than the day at West Point when he agreed to serve the Reich. It’s more important than the day at the Sanctuary when he was able to steal the plans for the weather machine. If he is successful today, he will go down in history.

He has to send the message to his contacts in France, which will require leaving the room. But that should be easy enough to arrange. The more challenging part of his day will come when Tesla tries to take some kind of action. Hallman must, at all costs, prevent the vampire from speaking with any of the High Command today.

“I said, do you think you could arrange for some tea?” Tesla says with the tone of a man who has had to repeat himself more than once. “Or are you going to daydream all day long?”

Hallman flashes his most winning smile. It’s almost like Professor Tesla wants to be played.

“Of course, sir,” he says. “I’ll go see what’s available in the mess. Just one cup, or will the others be in?”

“Just one cup,” Tesla says, slightly bitter. Confirmation, then, that Magnus and the others are gone. It never hurts to be sure.

“I’ll be right back,” he says, and turns on his heel.

“Don’t hurry on my account,” Tesla says sarcastically, all frustration and wounded pride.

He doesn’t know it, but today, Professor Tesla is the centre of Lieutenant Hallman’s universe. Together, they are going to help the Nazis win the war.

* * *

Colonel Korba pulls off his glasses to massage the bridge of his nose. He hadn’t needed spectacles before he gave up his eyes to the Reich. Like any good German, his eyesight had been perfect. But sacrifices were called for, and Korba had made his willingly. Usually, it doesn’t bother him, but every now and then the frames pinch his nose, and he has to take them off for a moment of respite.

If he opens his eyes without them, even the faintest of lights is too much for him. He is careful never to let anyone know that, how vulnerable he is without them. It wouldn’t do for that sort of information to make it into the hands of the Resistance. After today though, the Resistance won’t matter anymore, and Korba is only too happy to be present to witness its deathblow.

He holds in his hands a piece of paper bearing two seemingly disparate pieces of information that the spy in England was able to put together and deliver to him in Carentan. The weather machine is at risk, and the invasion will happen imminently. If it were from any other source, he would doubt its authenticity, and even as it is, he questions the logic. But there is one commonality he cannot disregard: Helen Magnus and James Watson have disappeared from Portsmouth, with their invisible friend in tow, and the spy in England thinks they have somehow gleaned the location of the weather machine, which means the invasion is not Norway or even Calais. It is much, much closer.

It’s a gamble. The British have been mercilessly efficient in turning German spies. Already there is misinformation aplenty, and another rumour is hardly useful. This is the first that Korba has heard of Normandy. It would be a remarkable coincidence. He has come too far to rely on coincidence.

Sitting up straight, Korba puts his glasses back on and signals for his aide.

“Sir?” the officer says, coming to attention.

“Tell Druitt his presence is required in Carentan. We will provide more details at a later time, but he is to be available as soon as possible,” Korba says.

“Sir, can we trust him?” He doesn’t usually encourage questions from his staff, but he appreciates some measure of initiative.

“No,” Korba says. “But he still thinks we do. We are about to capture some very dear friends of his, friends who are in possession of information that we need. It will be his job to extract it from them.”

“Surely he will refuse?” The officer has carefully written down the message, and is folding it into his pocket. “And then will he not be a danger to any who might be close to him?”

“We have prepared a surprise for Herr Druitt,” Korba says, an arrogant smile on his face. “The bunker where his friends will be held is made of a material that he will not be able to teleport out of. Once he comes into the bunker, he will be ours.”

“Very clever, sir.” The officer straightens, preparing to salute and leave the room.

“We shall find out,” Korba says, and waves his hand in a dismissive return of the man’s gesture.

Left alone in his office again, Korba adjusts his spectacles and turns back to the files on his desk. In these folders is every scrap of information pertaining to Helen Magnus that he has been able to buy, steal or torture out of captured abnormals deemed unworthy of the war effort. He has so many questions to ask her, and he has been waiting to make her acquaintance for some time now. They will use Watson to trap Druitt in the bunker, but Magnus…Magnus he is saving for himself.

* * *

Nikola has scrupulously taken his medication every day since his return to England. It wouldn’t do to lose control and attack one of his aides in a moment of pique. As he holds the paper with Druitt’s name on it, though, he finds himself wishing for something he could chase and sink his teeth into. He works alone, true, but this feeling of helplessness is not part of his usual arrangement.

He can no longer hear the planes. They’ve all passed over his head and left him behind. He has no idea what’s happening on the ground in France, only that the worst has happened. He trusts Helen to get herself out of this, but at the same time his inability to help her is making him crazy. His aide, the smiling one he’s become rather fond of, brought him black tea with his supper, and ever since he finished drinking it, Nikola has been uncomfortable.

On the roof of the house they’ve commandeered, the air is no clearer, but at least he has a greater chance of solitude. The lieutenant has been nailed to his backside all day, it seems, except when Nikola sends him out with messages to Eisenhower that go unanswered. He can only take so much youthful enthusiasm at a time. It’s starting to clog his thoughts.

It’s becoming increasingly apparent that neither of the governments that are holding him right now have any intention of letting him go. For all he knows, Churchill and Roosevelt are even now drawing up a treaty under which terms they’ll share him. He knows something similar is in the works with the Russians for what to do with the German scientists who survive the conflict. On one hand, Nikola admires the unexpected dedication to progress, but at the same time, it’s uncomfortable to know that his future is being bargained over and settled without his input. He will have to make a move as soon as it is reasonable to do so, but for the life of him, he can’t imagine what that move will be.

He hears the intruder on the stairs long before the man makes it to the roof. The step is too heavy to be the lieutenant’s, so Nikola resists the temptation to hide.

“Ah, Professor Tesla.” General Patton has as much reason to be restless tonight as Nikola does. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were up here.”

“It’s all right, General,” Nikola says, relaxing in spite of himself. Maybe certain company would be welcome. “I don’t own the roof.”

Patton goes to the railing and looks down. There’s not a lot to see, with the blackout curtains over every window and the street lights out. Portsmouth is a target, like everywhere else in Britain, and so it hides when the sun sets. Some nights, the Channel gleams white with moonlight, but tonight there are clouds, so not even that much illumination breaks through.

“This is the worst part,” Patton says. “The waiting.”

“I noticed,” Nikola says dryly. Tea is a comfort, but it always leaves him thirsty. He presses his tongue to the roof of his mouth, searching for the piece of the puzzle he is missing.

“On nights like this I feel old,” Patton says.

“You’re not,” Nikola says. “At least, you’re not as old as me.”

“That isn’t what I meant,” Patton says. He looks at Nikola, his eyes shining in what little light is available, and for a moment, Nikola has a flash of understanding. “I’ve done this before.”

“You’re a general,” Nikola points out. “Sending men into battle is your job.”

“I’ve sent men and been sent,” Patton says. “I’ve attacked and defended. I remember battles I didn’t fight, men I didn’t serve with.”

“Are you always this philosophical the night before an invasion?” Nikola smiles, a real smile, for what feels like the first time in months.

“I’m always this philosophical,” Patton says. “Usually there’s enough going on that no one notices.”

“That seems fair enough,” Nikola says. There is a long moment of easy silence between them, and suddenly the wait until morning doesn’t seem so unbearable.

It doesn’t last. But in those few moments of companionable silence, Nikola can see all the pieces with a clarity he hadn’t been able to manage before. The world slows, and he lifts first one piece and then another, sliding them into place beside one another where they fit, locking his suspicions and impressions together into solid facts and a course of action.

Druitt must have leaked the location of the weather machine. His affection for Helen, and James, would not let him sit idly by while one of James’s creations was misused. For whatever reason, Druitt had wanted them in Normandy.

That leaves two other things for Nikola to make sense of: the stolen plans and his bizarre inability to get the attention of General Eisenhower. Two things, and the cup of tea that ties them together.

“General, we have a spy,” Nikola says quietly. He’s not afraid of being overheard, not up here, but habits are hard to break.

“We’re aware,” Patton says, his voice equally quiet. It’s unusual for him, and Nikola knows that this is Patton at his most dangerous.

“I have figured out who it is,” Nikola says. “And he’s down in my office, probably rifling through the files on my desk right at this moment.”

“Should we use him or take him?” Patton asks. It’s a courtesy Nikola hadn’t expected, but it only takes him a moment to decide.

“Take him,” he says, his mouth full of teeth.

Patton doesn’t flinch at the shift, only nods and follows Nikola down the stairs. Nikola Tesla may work alone, but that doesn’t mean he is without ties to the outside world. Only a fool would endanger his friends.

* * *

Hallman finds the workroom deserted. He has no idea where Professor Tesla has gone, and he does not particularly care. It’s over, or it will be soon. All he has to do is find a way to cover his tracks, and then wait for his extraction. Then he will be in Germany, a Germany victorious in Europe, and his place there will be amongst the heroes of the war.

Reaching into his pocket, he removes the small sheaf of papers he takes his notes on. He finds a pertinent file on the desk and begins to write, carefully encoding as he goes. Impending victory is no reason to throw caution to the wind.

The Autotype begins to punch out a message, and he diverts to the machine. It must be from Griffin, passing news or calling for help. If Hallman can intercept it, so much the better. He turns his head to the side, just as the ‘A’ appears. By the time he sees the ‘F’, he knows the game is up.

Professor Tesla’s voice still startles him though, perfectly accented German spoken in a voice that’s blackout dark. Hallman looks to the doorway and sees him there, as perfectly poised as ever, but with the demon on his face. Hallman’s heart races, though he fights to give no sign. Tesla has always looked so civilized. It was easy to imagine that the rumours of what he’d done in the woods on the Eastern Front were exaggerations.

Now, Hallman is less sure. Those black eyes and perfectly deadly claws seem capable of everything, and Hallman has been caught. Tesla accuses him of greed, and Hallman would speak in his own defense, but the vampire has moved faster than any true human should, and those deadly claws press against Hallman’s throat. Whatever hope he had of keeping his fear to himself is gone now, but he still refuses to crack.

“How long?” There is a dark promise in that voice, but at the same time it is beautiful. He wants to tell it everything. Surely it will understand.

“I was recruited by the SS when I was still at West Point,” he says, looking straight at Tesla’s face. He’s forgotten, somehow, that the professor is only a Serb. Working alongside him, Hallman had come to admire the man, despite his lesser stock. At the same time, he can’t help shifting upwards, stretching his neck to avoid those claws. It only makes Tesla’s grip more tight. “My family supports the Reich. It was my duty.”

Surely, Tesla must understand that, that duty to his family and to his home; that duty which, though to opposing sides, is the only thing they share. Didn’t he fake his own death, after all? And return to aid his own kin, however justified their doom is? But there is no understanding on Tesla’s face. Only a smile with too many teeth, and every nightmare Hallman has ever had is playing in his mind. Perhaps he has misread the vampire more gravely than he thought.

Tesla releases him abruptly, those nails still hovering near Hallman’s face, and laughs dismissively.

“You were good,” he says, elegance and death at once. “But I was better.”

Hallman forces his voice level as he asks how Tesla knew, and maintains that apparent calmness as Tesla explains, at least until Tesla accuses him of leaking the information about Magnus and Watson. Then it’s only one claw at his neck, the fine point scraping over his skin too softly to do any damage, but with enough sincerity that he understands how completely at Tesla’s mercy he is.

“You made me like you,” Tesla grates, rage beneath the disappointment in his voice. Hallman wants to reply in kind, but fear quashes his ability to speak.

Tesla turns away to the soldier who accompanied him, the claw leaving Hallman’s throat at last. He breathes, relieved, and when Tesla speaks again, it is a human voice that Hallman hears.

“He’s ready,” Tesla says, as though he has already moved on from Hallman’s betrayal. The officer advances, sidearm drawn, but Hallman knows that resistance is futile.

“Professor,” he tries once more to explain, to make Tesla understand, but Tesla doesn’t let him.

“Enjoy your tribunal, Lieutenant,” Tesla says, and Hallman lets himself be led away.

* * *


	5. Albedo

**Albedo** : The ability of any surface to reflect the light that is directed at it

 _Studies in Betrayal: How to put the pieces back together_

 _You love her and you hate her in equal amounts these days. You’re not sure what that means. It used to just be love, incandescent and stupid, and now the hatred is eclipsing the parts of your soul where she once shone so brightly. You wonder if this means that someday, only the hate will be left. Maybe you will get lucky, and it will stop._

 _You never get lucky._

 _She tends to him as she once tended to you, practiced hands and touches you remember as softer than clinical, more intimate than competent, though she lacks nothing in competency either. You watch as she fixes the bandages on the bullet wound, as she brushes his hair away from his face to assess the damage. Your damage. The damage that you wrought upon the man you both love. She treated him in France, of course, before they left to come back home. What she does now is for her own sake, the touch of a lover that lets her know that her beloved is still whole._

 _You lost the right to her touch decades ago, but that doesn’t mean you crave it less, and it doesn’t mean that you can watch them without feeling the hatred grow in your soul. It is time to go, before temptation overwhelms you and you cross the line you swore you would never cross. There will always be victims other than the ones you loved, back when love was still within your grasp._

 _There is one in your mind now, burning in your thoughts. He is close, kept somewhere beyond your sight, but you know he is nearby. The betrayer who would have sold Helen and James to the Reich. He is yours, tonight. All you have to do is find him._

 _And you know exactly where to look._

* * *

Nikola smashes the bottle as soon as it is empty, the only outlet for the rage inside him. Helen and James are safe, Nigel is embedded with the French for the remainder of the fighting, and he is every bit as much the prisoner he was the day before. There is a guard outside his door, even now, and while he could overpower the man, Nikola is reluctant to play his hand before he has a plan in place.

There is a faint sound and a smell once familiar and now just a memory of happier times and harmless mischief. He smiles in the dark.

“Johnny,” he says, the full force of vampire in his voice. Suddenly, the world is full of opportunities again.

“Tesla,” John says. “Where is he?”

“Oh, Johnny, is that anyway to greet an old friend?” Nikola says. There is danger here, particularly if the guard outside decides to do something stupid, but it’s a rush and he’s not about to deny himself some fun.

“I am not in the mood, Nikola,” John says. He steps into the light, and Nikola can see the dark stain of blood that’s John’s own, though by the smell he knows it has been bandaged.

“I am,” Nikola says. “Do you have any idea what I’ve been through these past few days?” He looks at John with a deliberate gaze. “Oh, wait. You do. You’re a Nazi.”

“I am nothing of the sort,” John says. Nikola resists the urge to laugh. It has always been so easy to bait him.

“Honestly, I don’t care what you tell yourself so that you can sleep at night,” he says. “I have a proposition for you.”

“I’m not interested, Nikola,” John says.

“Oh, I think you are,” Nikola replies. “You want to know the location of a certain spy. I want to be taken out of this blasted country and set down somewhere a little less confining. I’d say we have all the makings of a perfect team.”

“Get on with it,” John says, and Nikola knows that he has won.

Moving quickly, he fills his pockets with the things he will need to start over. It isn’t very much. Fortunately, he has stores laid in all across Europe. Even with all the damage, at least one of them must have survived.

“Shall we?” he says, holding out his arm. John takes it, a hard grip that would bring a lesser man to his knees, but Nikola has never been a lesser man. “Listen carefully, and I’ll paint you a picture.”

* * *

The cell isn’t so bad. It’s dark and damp, of course. England seems to have little else to offer. He’ll be tried for his crimes and imprisoned, but it was worth it for the chance to serve the Reich.

There is a bright flash, and suddenly Hallman isn’t alone any more. The shorter figure is familiar, and for a moment, Hallman’s heart lifts. Then he sees the other man, whose story he has heard whispered for weeks now, and knows his time is up.

“Lieutenant,” Tesla says with such a solicitous tone of voice that Hallman thinks he might be dreaming, except for the cold fear that has clenched around his stomach. “You were always so glad to hear my stories. I don’t think I ever told you much about my friend John, though, and he was feeling left out, so I brought him down here.”

Hallman tries to scream, dignity or no, because there are things a man shouldn’t endure, no matter what his crime, but Druitt is abruptly behind him, a hand over his mouth, and Hallman wonders what it feels like to break in half.

“It’s so nice to meet you,” Druitt says. “I look forward to hearing your explanations as to why you chose to endanger my friends.”

Druitt reaches out to Tesla, and before Hallman can try anything, they are standing on the cliffs with the Channel crashing below them. The night, at last, is clear. By the white light of the moon, Hallman sees the knife descend.

* * *

Helen stands in the window, looking out over Portsmouth and trying to remember what the city had looked like before, when it could be lit against the darkness. She can’t recall. The night is quiet; all the fighting is across the Channel and beyond her control. In the silence when she couldn’t sleep, she had heard the hushed conversation in Nikola’s room that led to his bargain with John. She knows that somewhere close by, they are doing murder. And she could stop them, if she chose.

She hears a heavy step behind her, uneven gait marring what is usually a stealthy approach, and cannot help but smile as James’s arms go around her waist. This is why she will let murder happen tonight. Because of what the traitor nearly cost her. Besides, John’s soul is long past saving and Nikola has made it clear that his movements are none of her concern. She leans into James’s embrace, not caring that her back is pressing against hard metal. He presses his face into her hair, and kisses her neck.

“Come back to bed, Helen,” he says.

“I will,” she says, smiling. For now, their work is done. There will be more work tomorrow, and until the war is over she will not tempt herself with thoughts of peace, but tonight is her own, and she will spend it as she wills. She turns in his arms and kisses him. “I just wanted to look at the sky.”

“Is it a clear night?” he asks, though he can see just as well as she can.

“As clear as you could wish,” she says, and lets him draw her back to bed.

* * *

 **finis**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Acknowledgements: Thanks for Cole and Shada for the beta, and Shada for the amazing art!
> 
> [Book Cover](http://pics.livejournal.com/shadadukal/pic/006bx8xe)   
> [Fanmix](http://www.sendspace.com/file/8ayu4m)   
> [Front Cover](http://pics.livejournal.com/shadadukal/pic/006by7tp)   
> [Back Cover](http://pics.livejournal.com/shadadukal/pic/006bzd3z)
> 
> Notes: I borrowed a lot of fanon for this, from myself ([How to Fake Your Death (And Live to Tell About It)](http://archiveofourown.org/works/167157), [Three Plus One Is Five](http://archiveofourown.org/works/203914) and [Sketches](http://archiveofourown.org/works/204439)), as well as stories in the WWII era from such authors as DBalthasar, Penknife and Artaxastra. There is also a very, very small shout out to the Numinous World of Jo Graham.
> 
> Gravity_Not_Included, September 18, 2011


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